Cliff Notes

We've been doing a little of this and a little of that. But no matter what, it never slows down. I've been thinking a lot lately about how being an adult is a lot different than I thought as a kid. For some reason, I was sure that adults were always bored. Well, I can honestly say that I have not been bored in over a decade. And I have learned that you really never know what is coming next.

So much has happened in the last three weeks that I'm going to boil it down to the Cliff Notes version of life Templeton. Get ready to follow my stream of consciousness... conference weekend at the cabin with fam, Dad and my cousin Jared, 12th anniversay celebrated with dinner at the Roof in SLC (view of temple & city) a fun quick two day trip to Phoenix with Jana while she took her Pediatric Boards (also I think the only time I have been alone for more than 20 minutes in the last decade!), Rob got his permanent crown on front tooth, got a little netbook in preparation for Nanowrimo next month (National Novel Writing Month 30 days- 50,000 words), passed out six donation boxes for women's shelter, Kate on steroids (watch out!!!) planted 50 bulbs, 1 rose bush, 3 flats of pansies, and pulled my weight in weeds, trying to sell van, picked out new car, extended Templeton family pictures Emma got stung by a bee while waiting but smiled anyway, Humanitarian Night at RS (we're making procedure dolls/gowns for Primary Children's Hospital- kids use them to understand what is happening to them, assembled hygiene kits and school kits for the Humanitarian Center, and planned some new projects), watched poor Sierra devote every waking moment to her mountain of homework, drove to allergyshots/swimming/skating/ballet/gymnastics, finally got the front room floor installed, Emma brought home her first big chapter book from the library ( it was as big a milestone for me as riding a bike- I let her stay up late to read), and finally, cried with my friend and 1st counselor who lost her beautiful first baby just three weeks before his due date. Our whole neighborhood chipped in to send a beautiful white flower arrangement to the viewing yesterday. The whole experience reminded me how everything we have is a gift, and our time to enjoy them is short, sometimes, painfully short.

It turns out I married a hick

As hard as I tried to leave Wyoming, I found myself staring it in the face last Thursday night when Rob came home from indoor soccer. This men's league has now cost us one knee surgery, 14 stiches, and a new front tooth. A ball whacked Rob in the jaw (thankfully no damage there) and took half of his front tooth with it. After falling to the ground, and "graying" out, Rob got up and finished the game. I have to hand it to him, that is devotion. I am hard pressed to think of anything I would keep at in that situation. As a result of the hick makeover, Rob found himself in the dentist chair on Friday morning, and I found myself in my first gig as a substitute teacher giving sixth graders a spelling test. At first they stared at me like I was an animal in a zoo, after all, I am the teacher's wife, which is pretty mysterious in grade school. I wasn't there too long before it was lunchtime and I had to run Kate to preschool. I called Rob before I left to make sure there wouldn't be any problems with me leaving, and the dentist answered. He said Rob had his mouth full, but he would have him on his way in 15 more minutes, and that he did a bang up job breaking that tooth. I had to agree with him there!

I rushed Kate to preschool after a hurried McDonald's lunch, then went off to buy birthday presents for Sierra for her 13th birthday. That's right, I am the mother of a teenager! Sierra informed me the night before her birthday that she was going to wake up the next day and be a brat because now she is a teenager. Well, that didn't happen, thankfully. We celebrated her birthday with a dinner at Rodizo's Brazilian steakhouse, which all the kids loved because it is such a fun place to go. They sang to Sierra in Portuguese, complete with bongo drums and tamborine and she got a free flan. (Should have taken a picture, but I was too shy to ask!) We opened presents that night, with Sierra's favorite by far being her new cell phone. It is a nice phone, but on a prepaid plan, so after my initial load-up, she is in charge buying her minutes. I went this route after hearing the story from Julianne about her boss's daughter ringing up a $1300 cell phone bill. Yikes! We waited until Saturday for cake because we were all bursting at the seams from Rodizo's. On Saturday Sierra and her friends went to see Fame and hung out at the mall. We also watched 2 PG-13 movies that weekend in honor of her new privilege of watching PG-13s, a long coveted honor.

The week before this one was busy too. It started for me in ward council meeting, when suddenly the flu, or something awfully like hit, hit me hard. I rarely get sick enough to stay in bed, but I couldn't get out of bed for almost 2 days. But, as you can see from my nightstand picks, I did get a lot of reading done. Emma was feeling poorly too, so I just let her stay home because I figured if she felt like I did, she deserved to. And of course, Kate had a sinus infection the same week, so we had another round of antibiotics and a doctor's visit between naps. We rallied to make it to the Oktoberfest skating competition. Emma got a third place medal, and now she'll be changing her routinue. I also let Kate compete because she wanted to and I figured it wouldn't be any harder to have two there than one. Well, I was wrong about that. I could not find a costume for Kate (she is so tiny) and the seamstress couldn't make one because she had another project and one I found on the internet couldn't get here in time. So I did what all insane people do, I decided to make a costume. I figured, hey I have a sewing maching, I can figure this out. Well, I didn't figure on getting the flu, so this big project became an emergency that kept me up all night the night before handsewing this thing when my sewing machine kept jamming. Well, my little girl had a yellow costume. That's about all I can say. It kindof fell apart when I took it off of her, and you will notice that there are no close-up pictures of it. But I earned my Mother's Day flowers this year. And I decided that yes, it really is harder to have two kids in the same competition. And I am no seamtress. But note the beautiful cake I made filled with pudding was a success, so I guess I have a touch of domesticity in me somewhere.