All in One Weird Week

Life has been a little weird lately and I'm tired.    

No, I didn't say I'm weird,  though some would argue that that's also a true statement.   I'm referring to the fact that in amidst our normal busy life stuff, there has been a whole lot of really weird stuff making life even busier than usual and maxing out my mental bandwidth!     This blogpost shows a glimpse at one single week.  

Let's take a look at the somewhat normal stuff first.   

 It started off with dinner for the masses.  Yes, somehow hosting dinner for big groups has become a normal thing in our lives.   Glen smoked brisket and we had a ton of food:  

We had a decent turnout of people (about 30 all together)...

We love having our ward members in our home and feeding them home-cooked food...

And the food was definitely a hit, though I made too much corn and too many lemon bars...

I did a postcard challenge with some of them (everyone in this picture) and that was fun.  What is a postcard challenge, you ask?   It's when I challenge them to give me a word/theme and I go through my stash and send it to them in the mail.  It's a really fun way to share my postcards with them and to challenge myself to dig into the depths of my postcard stash.  Some words that challenged me this round were rutabaga, carrots, and garnishment.   

We have an awesome ward!   

It's been a very warm and dry winter overall, but we've had a little more rain lately.   One of the days we went on a wet walk...

This is what I looked like after...

I found these  cute photos taken by Emma in the camera roll that made me smile...

I hosted book group one night, then went to see Bella M. perform in Romeo and Juliet in the BYU ballet the next night, then went to a Valentine's dinner with a bunch of Kristina's friends that have relocated to Utah.   I do have to say that talking about books, seeing old friends at the ballet, and hanging out with new friends was all good for my psyche with all the other weird stuff going on.   I made these heart-shaped O-Henry bars for the Valentines dinner, then served the rest at our family dinner the next night.  

 

The sister of one of our ward members came to town for the long weekend.  After talking with her, we learned that she had just returned from serving in Ellie's mission.  What did I do?   I started blubbering and crying, because she'd seen our missionary more recently than me, which made me extra excited for June.  I am not a big crier, but I've been missing our missionary extra ever since she went past the year mark in December!  

Here's a glimpse at the Sunday dinner that week...we had burger bowls, which were extremely delicious and enjoyed by all at our full table!   This is where we enjoyed the rest of the heart shaped O-Henry bars.  

So that's mostly all the normal stuff. 

Let's get on to the weird stuff (definitely no pictures of this craziness).

1.  I have somehow become the assistant for helping an elderly relative evict an adverse tenant who has overstayed his welcome.   It's been a LONG, exhausting process which involves talking to attorneys, calling the suicide hotline multiple times, and trying to protect my relative from being taken advantage of.  We are going to great lengths to try to do this in a way that's a win-win for everyone, but it's hard when one of the parties is not a reasonable person.   I am ready for this process to be over.  

2. I left a negative review for a place on Google and the owner PICKED A FIGHT with me!    It was actually pretty bad and we ended up deleting our review, because we are chickens and they totally called us out by name.  We did absolutely nothing wrong, but they said a lot of inflammatory, gaslighting, threatening things (something we noticed they do with all of their negative reviews).  I still get very angry about it every time I think about it, and I really wanted to leave it up, because we did nothing wrong, but Glen was concerned because his name got dragged into the whole thing.  Seriously evil.   Please let me know if you ever want to go to a therapist office in Provo and I would love to tell you which one to run the other way from.  The way they attack any critique on them whatsoever tells you all you need to know about the way they do business and does not reflect well on a business that has to do with mental health.  We deal with a lot of  therapist offices with Glen's calling and every single interaction we had with them was an exercise in extreme frustration.   The owner of this office is clearly not mentally well himself, because mentally well people do not treat other people {even those that disagree with the way they do things} the way that he does.     I  started listening to "Let it Go" on repeat and did some hard exercises trying to burn off some negative energy and get my brain to a more positive place. 🙄

 <deep breath>  

And lest you think that's all of the weird stuff...it's not. That's just all that happened in that one week. I'll blog more about the rest of it later, but the weirdness definitely did not subside after that week was over. Some things to look forward to in  upcoming blogposts: an out of town funeral, a serious injury on the way home from said funeral, an apocalyptic snowstorm for some of my kids, an unexpected trip, and a sacrament talk ...plus more eviction drama.   yay.



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Life Via Quotes to My Missionary

 I grew up in a home where being funny was valued as a desirable trait.   I tried really hard to be funny when I was young, but at some point had to admit that quick wit that requires the ability to think on your feet is completely and totally beyond the scope of how my brain works.   Self-deprecatory sarcasm is usually about where my humor efforts land these days--like "Oh, yeah.  I can totally win a karaoke contest.  Just sign me up and I'm there."  It's total hogwash, but relies on the other person knowing I'm a terrible singer to even be slightly funny.   And because there isn't actually any wit involved, it's not actually funny at all.  And some people might actually believe me and think I'm just a really confident singer and if I'm not careful I'll be asked to be the primary music leader or something.

  But, I digress.       

Recently I came across a few of my old blogposts and was reminded of the fact that  I'm not quite as unfunny in writing as I am in person.   Don't get me wrong.   I fully know that 99.3% of the posts on this blog are about as boring as the footnotes of a textbook on ferns, but, I do have written evidence that I have  occasionally posted mildly funny content.    

Here are a couple that made me laugh... (10 commandments of a teenage boy,  princesses don't toot, three versions of how to pack, helpful advice) 

But, I still claim no real wittiness, even in writing.    Really, it's all about the kids.   Kids make life funny and the only kids left in my life are living 2000+ miles away from me, therefore I continue on blogging like an out of work botanist.  Not that I'm calling all botanists boring, but maybe some.       

So, you all know my style well enough to know that I'm not really into writing long essays on any topic, so I must be  leading this blogpost to be about something from our lives and you're right.   Today you get the privilege of reading about our lives via some direct quotes from a recent letter I sent  to my sweet missionary. I didn't really start off trying to be funny, but I do admit to feeling slightly off-kilter that night.   Long Sundays will do that to me! Vote in the comments if you have a favorite quote and whether you think I should always blog in an off-kilter state of mind or if I should stick with   blogging only when I’m well rested and feeling sedate (which would be never). 

      
QUOTE 1: 
" I am writing this letter to you today under the influence of not eating since breakfast, spending 13 hours at church (a typical Sunday of late), then stuffing myself silly at 8pm with a lunchmeat sandwich and previously frozen brownies.

DINNER OF CHAMPIONS!!!!! 💣

Do you want me to send you the recipe? Of course you do. It was fantastic and you'll probably want to make it every day.

INGREDIENTS:
lunchmeat
cheese
mayo
sauerkraut
bread (if you're me then make it gluten free)

brownies, broken into bite size pieces (frozen for at least 3 weeks)

DIRECTIONS:
Slather it all together (brownie bites intermingled with sandwich bites) and eat within 2 minutes 37 seconds.
ENJOY!


Next time I make it, I'll take a picture, so you can see how it all comes together." 


QUOTE 2:   
Oh look at that! We had a ward party on Tuesday night. 


There are cute guys in this picture that I would totally set you and Hermana B. up with....just say the word in 7ish months or so...


Sorry...that's the lack of sleep talking....you can forget I even said anything.

You'll never guess what I was in charge of for the party.

I'll give you three guesses....

1. teaching everyone the macarena?

NO!

2. bull fighting?

Good guess, but no.

3. karaoke leader?

Heaven help us all....that would be a big fat NO to the heck no!


I guess I'll just tell you and you can stop wondering.

I was in charge of making gluten free versions of all the Thanksgiving food.

Shocker, I know.

I made rolls using an expensive mix that were meh. Totally not worth what I paid for the ingredients....


But the apple pie...

It may look hideously hideous, but the taste was perfecto! 😋 Go ahead and lick the screen now. "


QUOTE 3: 
"CAN YOU GUESS WHAT THIS PICTURE IS?

It's the tea set we got Emma for her birthday. She decided that she wanted to keep working on her Britishness, so she's brushing up on her British accent and is holding a daily tea party for the entire YSA branch. 5am every day. For Christmas I'm sending her scones and clotted cream. 

 {Note:  This was meant to be the aforementioned sarcastic humor of which is my specialty, but then my own son asked if this were a true statement, thereby confirming the fact that my humor is actually rather humorless.} 

Speaking of your sister....here she is with her friends at the Boston Temple...probably pretending to be British if I had to guess. I hear she asked for the British translation of her temple session..."



QUOTE 4: Adam, on the other hand, is working on his peanut butter game. He got invited to a peanut butter party and sampled one of everything...Can you guess what he and {his girlfriend} made? HINT: It was my recipe and they borrowed my pie pan for the occasion. 



QUOTE 5: Oh, I have some life advice to give you now. Very serious life advice, which you should probably write in your journal and tell ALL of your friends. Whatever you do, DO NOT GO TO TRADER JOES ON AN EMPTY STOMACH!!!!! It's a problem. Perhaps not the worst problem ever, but a problem nonetheless. 




QUOTE 6:  "The other night, I brought Nutella uncrustables to our friend, J., for her 20th birthday. Lest you think me the randomest birthday treat giver ever, I'll remind you that J. is the one whose Mom grew up in Minnesota and her family now lives in Cami's ward, so I had sent a little text to her Mom and got her suggestions. She was actually quite excited!" 


QUOTE 7: We also went to the temple this week and had an awesome turn-out. Notice who's NOT in this picture? YOUR PADRE!!! Why didn't he come to this beautiful night at the temple? Was he too busy at work? Yes, but he was going to come anyway. Did he bruise his tailbone wrestling with Kiwi? Good guess, but NO! He was all ready to walk out the door and realized that he'd let his temple recommend expire. So Bishop G. didn't come to the temple because his recommend was expired. oops.

Okay, back to cute guys. I would give you and Hermana B the thumbs' up on any guy in this picture. CUTE AND RIGHTEOUS GUYS THAT LIKE TO GO TO THE TEMPLE! What could be better than that?! Absolutely nothing, but there I go again."

QUOTE 8: I'll close off with one more picture of a few of our ward members....


Can you tell this is kind of our lives right now? We had church activities Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday.   This was taken at institute on Thursday night. If you weren't in the habit of going to institute before your mission, I highly recommend it when you get home. It's a night to be spiritually and physically fed AND you get to hang out with friends. It is awesome. And lots of cute guys."  

THE CONCLUSION:  

This blog would probably be a lot more entertaining if I blogged only after spending 13 hours at church and after gobbling down  food for dinner with minimal nutritive value.   Though, perhaps it's best for the people who love me, if I keep things more sedate.   

Also...my poor missionary!  I felt kind of bad the next day after talking about guys so many times.  That is not normal for me.  But at least I wrote a letter, so I'll pat myself on the back for that.     

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!    

A Quick Bit of Summer Catch-up

Hello, friends!   Here's the quickest catch-up post ever from the last few weeks of summer, so I don't forget to get it down and, also, so that I can move onto other things to blog about.    

My college friend, Brenda, recently came to town.  It had been many years since I'd seen her and it was great to catch up!   She played a role in Glen and I getting together, so she holds a special place in our hearts.  

Here is Emma with the stake RS presidency she served with before she moved away.  They really miss her, as do I.     

Here is Glen with the EQ presidency from our old ward (minus the secretary)...

Before we were officially sustained in our new ward, I had my "old ward" RS presidency over one last time.   

We made food as a service for someone with health issues in the ward and just had fun eating, playing games, and hanging out together.  This is where I told them that we would be leaving them the following week.   

 Leaving them so soon after starting is honestly one of the hardest parts about getting this new calling.  I felt like we had just learned everyone's names and were just starting to develop some good relationships.   That's okay though...we are already feeling the Lord's hand working to help us in our new ward and now we'll have double the YSA friends!  

The last week in August Emma came back from Rhode Island to be in a friend's wedding.   

We loved, loved, loved having her around again...

It made the week extra busy, but it also made the week extra good!  

#bonustimewithemma

 Adam was around for part of the same week Emma was here until he could move into his new apartment.  We did A LOT of yardwork together while he was here and I think we wore him out pretty good by the time he moved into his new apartment.  

I'll be honest...we were pretty darn exhausted by the time church rolled around on Sunday for our first official week in the new ward.  There are A LOT Of moving pieces getting a ward up and running at the beginning of a new school year and being brand new makes it all the more intimidating / hard. This picture shows us in front of our new church building.   

It's a cool old building on BYU Campus, but doesn't have good classrooms, so we move over to  another building for 2nd hour.      

Adam just started at his new ward this past week as well and his Bishop gave everyone in the ward a sand dollar from the Oregon coast as a welcome gift.  

I haven't blogged about it yet, but will soon...but we were just in Oregon visiting Adam's mission.   While we were there, we spent some time at the coast and Adam searched high and low for sand dollars, but never found an intact one.  

The gift seemed like a little tender mercy / confirmation that he's right where he's supposed to be for this school year.  

  And that, folks, is all I've got for today.  Hopefully I'll blog about our trip to visit Adam's mission soon and wrap up maybe one more summer post, before moving on to a very busy fall!  Thanks for tuning in today!  💗

The Blogpost Wherein Lara Seals Herself into Nerdiness Lore

Q.  Nerdiness lore?  What's that?  

It's that blogpost wherein Lara inexplicably refers to herself in third person and does a FAQ where she both asks  and answers her own questions, which means if you all thought she was nerdy before, now you have it confirmed.  This post will probably get referenced in future editions of the Webster online dictionary when you search the word, "nerdiness".    

Q.  Why would she do such a thing?  

Because she's been up since 5:00am (for an airport run), has barely stopped moving for an entire month, and would rather blog than be productive.  

Q.  So, what's going on to make life busy enough that would make her want to  write such an incriminating blogpost?  

As mentioned in the most recent blogpost here on this very illustrious blog, she's hosted a whole lot of guests, had 40 gazillion things on her to-do list, gone out of town for 10 days (blogpost to come), and is in the throes of preparing her third talk in five months to be delivered tomorrow.   Also, Glen got called to be Bishop of a BYU YSA ward last week, so there's that too.     

Q.  That is a lot.  How does she feel about it all?   
   
Happy to have made a lot of happy memories this summer.

Lukewarm on giving yet another talk in church. 

Terrified about the time this new calling will entail, as well as the physical and mental energy that will be required.    

Super excited to get to know and love another whole  ward  (yes, a different ward than they'd been serving in the last few months).   

And super intimidated about learning 180 new names and trying to love them all unconditionally.

Q. How do they feel about hanging out in Provo so much?  

Mostly great.  It is more late nights and driving back and forth than they're used to, but they're really hoping that their service will continue to be meaningful to both them and the people they'll be serving.  

Q.  What scripture keeps coming to their minds during all this?  

The parable of the loaves and the fishes.   In many ways, this is a calling that require more of them than they have to give, so they are taking heart in knowing that the Lord can multiply their efforts, however paltry they may be, and make it enough.     



And here's the big question I know that's really burning on all your minds...

Q.  Will she have time to continue updating this blog regularly?  

Heck, yes!   She will make the time...

This picture, taken in Oregon, was to commemorate their last Sunday of sitting together in church for a while

Cam's Big Summer Update

Alright, here we go with the next installment in our series of  What Our Family is Up To where I go person by person and give a little update on what we're all doing this summer.  You can see previous updates on Ellie, Adam, and Emma here and more will be coming soon.     This update is the only one that will feature more than one person, since Cami now has a couple cute little attachments (and a tall handsome one) that come along with her on her life adventures!  

Speaking of cute little family members, I guess I'll start off with the family pictures they had taken in May.  They were taken by a photographer friend of theirs on the grounds of the apartment complex they've lived in the last 3 years (Tributary Rise).  They turned out quite adorably if you ask me and it's fun that the photos captured a glimpse of the place that they've grown to love so much!   

 Next, I'll get on to the biggest family update of all...

 In June, Garrett finished up his internal medicine residency at the University of Alabama - Birmingham and Cami worked her last day as a nurse at Children's of Alabama and they packed up their apartment and moved approximately 1200 miles northeast for Garrett's fellowship at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.   

The moving crew consisted of 5 full-time missionaries, Garrett's parents, and of course Cami and Garrett...

And Lucie and Oliver...

Sadly, Rhode Island is approximately 500 miles further away from us, but I am happy to report that plane tickets there are cheaper and more plentiful than they were to Birmingham, so we are taking that as a win!  

Plus their state bird is a chicken, so that's fun... 😆

They took three days to drive to Rhode Island, hitting a new state along the way (South Carolina), visited Garrett's sister Ashley and family in North Carolina, and spent a night in Virginia where they visited the house we raised our family in...

and visited with AnnaLisa and Tim where Lucie and Oliver apparently charmed the socks off them and quite enjoyed playing with Tim's cat, Ash...

Then on Monday, they rolled up to the house they'll likely be living in for the next 3 years!   It's old and doesn't have AC or a dishwasher, but after apartment living for the last several years, they're excited to have a little room to run around!   

In the meantime, Oliver started walking (finally!) and Lucie is really excited to make new friends.   I was also quite delighted with Lucie's reaction (shown above) when she received her first postcard from me in their new mailbox.   She didn't realize that postcards could come to Rhode Island too!   Each new discovery of something familiar in Rhode Island (like a farm, Lifetime Fitness, primary, etc), makes her happy!

Now, I am eagerly trying to figure out when I can come visit  my favorite  new New Englanders!