My Selfish Summer Plans, Mother's Day Revisited, and other assorted happenings

This was the last week of school before summer break.

It feels great to be on this end of the week
as opposed to last Monday.

It was kinda crazy--
finals, finishing up last minute projects,
pushing the yahoos to get every little thing turned in
for those final grades.

Whew!
I'm exhausted.

And ready for Summer.

I'm calling this my
"Selfish Summer"...
I'm going to really work on treating my body
more like a temple
and less like a Drive-In movie lot.

ya get me?

One goal is to walk every morning
for as long as I want to.
No miles,
no time,
just me, my ipod loaded with my favorite tunes,
and may be one of the dogs.
No kids.

I am thinking (and hoping) that this ritual will do two things:
*Work my bahooey off
*Save my sanity

Cuz' seriously, Mr W's already having dreams wherein he comes home from work, and Momza ain't nowhere to be found.

He fully supports my "Selfish Summer" goals.

Other things on my SS list:
Paint this house.
Room by Room.
Any color I want, with total disregard for anyone under 5'8" tall's opinion.
I've got one more summer
before the kids start passing me up in this house,
so ya know I gotta take advantage of that.

Also,  I'm going to practice the piano every day.
Even if it's 8am in the morning.
It's about time I do more than dust that beautiful instrument.

I'm also thinking of dragging my family thru a month of Vegetarianism.
Nana's already doing it,
all the cool kids are doing it,
summer's a great time to get fresh veggies
so ya know...
Why Not? I say. Why not?

SO that's alls I got for my Selfish Summer.

I guess I should share my awesome Mother's Day--
it was so busy,
I still sorta cringe when I think about it.

We had Dean down for the weekend.
We went to Golden for Dani's ward meetings
bc she spoke in her sacrament on the topic
of, what else?--
Motherhood.
She said alot of different things,
wonderful things,
inspiring things,
but my favorite part was when she shared
her love of the Gospel.
And me.
Dean liked it almost as much as I did,
but right towards the end of her talk,
he said OUTLOUD so everyone could hear,
"Dani, you got two minutes!" 
She noted his comment, "That's my handicapped brother Dean, keeping me in line as always." and continued on like a professional despite her brother's
heckling.


Mr W and the yahoos gave me a new fancy-schmancy camera--
and I've been taking all kinds of pictures with it.
Sadly, tho, our pc is about to kick the bucket,
and won't let me upload anything.
Yeah. I know.
It's only 6 years old, FCOL.
I have shoes older than this pc and cost way less!
I'm just sayin'.

For Mother's Day I also rec'd a lovely handmade shutterfly book
from Danielle filled with pictures and memories of the two of us.
I didn't get past the first page without bawling.
She shoulda wrapped it with a Kleenex box inside,
because seriously, there was some "ugly" cryin' goin' on.

David Scott sent me the sweetest card--
I want to save it forever.
But first, I have to find it again.
I read it, bawled (it's what I do)
and then promptly mis-placed it.
But, really, it was beautiful and I loved his words to me.

Dean gave me an assortment of wood projects he's made,
and a card and a potted purple chrysanthemum.

Diana gave me a lovely oil painting to go over my mantel,
and a bouquet of flowers.

Dara...shoot what did she give me?  Oh yeah, the camera.

Joseph brought me  a lovely bouquet of flowers too.

Arianna made me a card that I am going to keep forever and ever,
amen.
Inscribed was :
"Happy Mother's Day Mom.
I love you so much because
you're the only one who can handle my anger.
I love you."

true story.
Girlfriend is a hot head.
I talk her off the ledge somedays,
and others,
I thank her for the entertainment,
and still others,
I tell her I didn't buy a ticket for her show
so I'll be leaving right then.

She calms down eventually,
and we both agree that's a crummy waste of ten minutes.

Speaking of time and wasting it--
as we were leaving a very very very long commencement from
Mr Idaho's college,
Joseph said,
"Well that's 3 hours of my life I'll never get back."
Ari chimed in with a "Can I get an 'Amen'?"
 "Amen.", came the crowd around us as we walked back to the car.

Tonight, being the first night of Summer Break,
Mr W and Joseph went on a big hike up to Stanley Canyon
with the scouts
where they're spending the night.
The girls and I treated ourselves to dinner and a movie night at home.
On the way home from dinner,
they sang at the top of their lungs with the radio.
At one point,
n' I don't know if I could even relate the entire conversation correctly,
but it ended with Ari exclaiming: "Don't judge my boobs!"
I laughed so hard, I almost pulled the car over.

Girls.

Diana, also laughing her guts out, looked at me,
and said, "I'm gonna miss this so much."
Then she committed her sisters to write down every new song they hear
for the entire 18 months she'll be gone on a mission,
and make a CD every 6 months to save for her when she returns.
I do believe there was a "pinky promise, promise" in there.
Emphasis on the double promise, promise.

Arianna had her 5th grade "Continuation Ceremony" last night.
It was my last night in elementary school.
I feel both liberated and sentimental about the whole thing.
Now, the ceremony was just as you'd expect from a 5th grade class.
Too long.

But, it was a celebration for Ari because
she had her sisters fix her hair,
paint her nails,
she wore a new little white eyelet sundress
and a sweet ruffled green cardigan over it
with new floral KEDS sneakers.

She looked like an 11 year old girl,
while some of her classmates looked like
they were going to Prom.

Of course I took pictures,
but ya know, I can't upload...
pssh.

This is the first week,
where we only finished up one staging
and that was that!
It turned out to be a good thing,
because we had some flu bugs going around
and Diana got strep throat AND scarlet fever,
so I was needed at home anyway.
And,
I took BEFORE and AFTER pics of the homes we staged
this last month,
but again, I can't get them to all upload.
N' I don't wanna only upload the BEFOREs without the AFTERs.


Lastly,
this morning as I was making my bed,
I accidentally knocked my rings off the nightstand,
and one rolled so far away,
that I had to get on my knees to be able to retrieve it.
And, for no good reason,
while I was on my knees,
I suddenly was compelled to say my morning prayers
right that second.
Even while my bedroom door was open,
and the other side of the bed wasn't made yet,
and Mr W was shaving in the bathroom,
and I hadn't been thinking about my prayers this morning
yet, at all.
But there I was, on my knees,
and this is a sign I must be getting really old--
because I thought,
"Hmmm. I'm already down here. I might as well pray."

So. ya know. I did.
Because  when you're old,
it's not so easy anymore to get down and up again
on your crackly knees,
so when you're down there,
aside from picking off lint from the floor,
and seeing a random candy wrapper that some carefree child tossed there,
you get to the point where common sense takes over,
and you make the best of it.


Also in the news:
My BFF Nan had her big 5-0 birthday this week.
I invited some of our friends over for a brunch to celebrate her.
I want to confess right here, that I made absolutely nothing from scratch.
And there was not one complaint!
We laughed and laughed,
and I asked each gal ahead of time,
to write some special memories they had of Nan,
which I printed out and put in a little folder for her.
During the brunch,
each sister read aloud what they'd written.
It was sweet and funny,
and almost like she'd died--lol!!
She laughed and cried at the same time,
so I know it was a successful celebration of our loving friend.

In other news:
A woman in Colorado Springs was arrested for trying to rob a 7-11 with a potato.  Liquor was involved. The potato was also held as evidence and is no longer roaming the streets of Colorado Springs, but so far no charges have been filed.  True story right there. This, on the same day that Pres. Obama was here for the Air Force Academy Graduation.  One town, much diversity.

Lastly, my most favorite talk from General Conference was this one:
 Laborers in the Vineyard.

N' that's all I got right now.