Happy Birthday #1 Son

At the request of my oldest son, I have been asked to write a story about the circumstances surrounding his birth. I can't remember anything political except that Nixon was impeached the fall before he was born. So the President of the United States was Gerald Ford. The Prophet of the Church was Spencer W. Kimball. 

Thirty five years ago last month, my first son was born at 9:02 am. We had traveled to my Mother's and Dad's house for the weekend. Mom didn't want me to spend the night, in case I went into labor, so we traveled the hour back to our apartment that night. My husband was still in school there and his job was to feed horses on a Thoroughbred Farm on weekends in exchange for our rent. He fed the horses when we got back. While he was working, I thought I  might be starting labor. Of course this would be my first birth, so I wasn't sure, so I didn't say anything to my husband. We retired to bed at 9 pm. But the labor pains continued every 5 minutes. By midnight, I finally awoke my sweetheart. We called the Elders Quorum President and asked them to come and give me a Priesthood blessing. Then he and his wife followed us to the hospital. The kind nurses didn't officially admit us until after midnight so we weren't charged for another day. And thus began a very LONG HARD night. I think I was afraid of labor. Back in those days we weren't given the wonderful drugs that block all the pain. They did administer some sort of pain killer, but the labor overpowered the drugs. I slept fitfully and walked the floor a lot as my dear husband sat by my side.

The doctor placed some sort of monitor on my baby's head, and another monitor on my belly. My husband claims that I am the one who made his round ring turn oval, I squeezed it so hard. I guess I believe him. I was in terrible pain. Later the doctor said he had never seen such hard labor. The monitor had paper a read-out, and the my labor jumped up to baby's heart beat on the paper every time. They were two minutes long and one minute apart for at least 9 hours.

After a very long night, I finally fell asleep, and the doctor woke me up to transfer me to the gurney so we could go to the delivery room. That is the worst to have to hoist your belabored body twice as you are experiencing such heavy labor. Thank Heavens for birthing rooms now-a-days.

My sister and my husband's sister had traveled to Europe the September before and had purchased a Euro-rail pass and both secured jobs and lived there. My sister stayed for 6 months and came home just in time for his birth. The whole time they were in Europe, they both were sure they were getting a nephew. They were right.  I had chosen his first name long ago, and chose his second name to be after his father. He was the first grand baby on his Dad's side and the third living on my side. Two cousins were born in September, the year before and after his birth who both died. Heidi and Christy were both born premature and had respiratory distress syndrome.

That is the physical aspect of the story, but the emotional part is clearly different. From the time I was a little girl, I wanted a son first, so all the rest of my children could have an older brother. I even had his name picked out, unless I married someone by that name. If I could have figured it out, I would have had an older brother for my first son. I guess his dad sort of filled that position. He was an amazing dad to our children. S1 adored his dad and followed him around everywhere.

S1's labor was so hard, he had a hematoma on his head that took a month to go down. He also got jaundice  right after we were dismissed from the hospital, so being a mom for the first time was a bit stressful. His daddy was so excited to have a baby, that he wanted very much to be a part of the whole process, so immediately, he began feeding him. He gave him a bottle with formula and even fed him baby food. He had purchased a variety from the grocery store and had them on hand. Blueberry Buckle was his choice. Naturally when I discovered it, I told him that was NOT allowed, but S1 knew a good deal when he had it. Blueberry Buckle tastes MUCH better than mother's milk and he preferred his dad from day ONE. I gave up nursing at one month.

S1 turned out to be wonderful older brother. We had another son two years later, so they were buddies and had someone to play with.

I had pictured what he would look like, but he turned out even more wonderful and handsome/beautiful (if babies are handsome) than I could have ever imagined. As he grew, he took his responsibility of oldest brother very seriously. He cared for his younger siblings like a hen watches her chicks. And even since he has grown and has children of his own, he continues to watch out for the rest of the family.

Sweetest Number One Son: I love you dearly. You are an amazing young man, the best I could have ever hoped for. May God bless you for at least another 35 years, and more if possible. May you live a healthy life and long enough to see great grand children. You are a good father, husband and son. I couldn't have asked for anyone better. I brag about you all the time and am so proud of you.

Thank you for all you do in your wonderful life.

Today I am Thankful for. . .

. . . a brand new grand son. Born on Veterans day, 11 November 2009. No name that we know of yet, but that will come soon enough.

Hello Little Guy. Your parents sent me a text on my phone, but because it wasn't anywhere near me, I didn't discover it until 4 hours later when I saw one of my children's entries on FaceBook!!
Then I went to check my phone, and sure enough there was the announcement:

Born 9 am weighing 7 pounds and 19.5 inches long. You are most welcome into our family. How fun! All three of my son's wives were expecting together. How cool is that?

You are so welcome into our family. I can hardly wait to hold you in my arms and look into your sweet face. Your mom and dad have discovered a really good recipe, as your older sister is one of the most beautiful little girls to ever have been born. She is in a great competition with the other 8 of my grand daughters, who are also the most beautiful little girls to ever have been born. You are born into a wonderful family. You couldn't have a more dedicated mommy who adores children. She spends many hours just playing with her babies. She is a great photographer and artist. And your dad is about the sweetest person in the world. He never has a bad word to say about anyone. He is a dedicated young man. He is multi-talented. Playing the guitar and painting are among some of his talents. He is working two jobs, speaking Chinese at one and keeping a good insurance for his family at the other. Plus he is going to school. Some day, he will be a physicians assistant. I think you will find your home life very happy.

You have two sets of adoring grandparents. I know your other set is just as excited as I am. And you will have many, many cousins to love. I am a bit jealous of that, as my nearest cousin was a boy and he was 2 years older. His older brother was 10 years older and his sister was 11 years older. On the other side, my next closest cousins were my little brother's age. Twin boys born 10 years after me. So you are lucky to have cousins closer to your age.

You might think after having 6 children myself that there just couldn't be more room in a mother's heart, but as they grew up and chose mates, and then the grand children were born, her heart just keeps expanding and she falls in love all over again as each one is born.

I hope you have a LONG life filled with health and happiness.

Now this makes a total of 13 grandchildren and four grandsons. The girls dominate our family, but that is perfectly fine. They are just as darling as the boys.

Now I had better go get busy sewing you a blanket. I hope they choose a name soon, so I can embroider it onto the blanket before I come up to meet you. We just got a text from your mom who says we can come up Saturday to see you. I can't wait.

Love you little guy and Welcome To The Family.
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

God bless you and your wonderful family.

Love,
Grandma

Neighbors

My daughter just moved. I don't know how her new neighbors are, but she really disliked the ones who lived next to her on one side at the other apartment. They were loud when the baby was sleeping, made rude comments to her when she came in late after going to the gym (her only time to work out) and left cigarette butts on the ground and dog poop in the grass where her son liked to play. Their bedroom is adjacent to the neighbor's. They could hear them "recreate" all night sometimes. How gross is that?
I hope she has better ones now. She lives on the ground floor like last time, and I hope they are more insulated. You could hear the woman's high heels walk across the floor all the time.

Neighbors can be hard. That is why I would like to live WAY out in the country away from 8 barking dogs on one side, away from a nosy one on the other side who uses his very large flashlight to see if we are home. Away from the one two blocks from here who decides to play his drum and his friend the electric guitar for up to two hours right during our dinner hour, so we really don't want to sit out on the patio to eat, besides the stupid dog on the other side, there is no peace. Away from the train that honks four very LONG blasts in the middle of the night (really the train engineers are my neighbors as well). Away from the large trucks who use our street to get to Main Street and shift up four gears just as they progress away from the stop sign on the corner, so when we talk, we have to cease for a minute to be able to hear one another.

I do have one I LOVE. Sister R, across the street, is around my mom's age. She is so wise. I love visiting her and philosophizing with her. She is amazing to me and I want to keep her around forever. I want to be just like her when I grow up.

Whenever we get the old Sunday School lesson on "who is your neighbor", I always feel guilty. I think, at heart, I am really a country girl, even though when we moved to the farm I cried for months every time I went out to the clothes line and hung diapers. We had just left a four-duplex neighborhood of young parents. Anytime I felt lonely, I would wash a batch of diapers and go outside to hang them. There was always someone in one of the other back yards hanging their diapers.

But I learned to love the quiet. I loved the darkness of the night with no lights but the stars. As Roon Dimik said in Big Business, "the only thing crowded was the sky studded with stars." I could actually see the Milky Way every night there. I was afraid of skunks, but that was about it.
I haven't seen stars very much since we moved to the neighborhood. Too many street lights.

I just got back from a short vacation to see my mom and children. Mom's house is located on 18 acres. She has neighbors, but they are fairly far away. Tonight after we unloaded our car, there to greet me, when I checked the mailbox, was a stupid dog barking at me. *sigh* I didn't miss him at all.

~a

Happy Father's Day

In honor of the Dads in my life, I want to write a bit.

Daddy, of course was the first Dad in my life. He called me his "little Tweedy". Even when I was in High School, I was "Tweedy".
As the middle girl of three and before my brother was born, I decided Daddy needed a boy. He had three girls, so he needed a boy. Mom had my older sister who was "Suzie Homemaker", so I assigned myself as Daddy's "boy".
I went to the shop with him and learned about mechanics and building. He gave me a chisel and a board to play with while he built cabinets. I played with the ball barrings when he was machining. I watched him build the house, I learned to lay brick, I mixed the mortar so it was ready for him when he came home from work.
I learned to milk the cow and was the substitute when he had to go away on a business trip.

The next two dads, were my grandpas. My Grandpas would hold me on their knees, take us on rides on the tractors, and there was always a dish of candy waiting us when we came to visit. Grandpa S got us lemon drops and M&M's.
These three men served as the dads in my life as I grew up until I met my future husband and married him. My Father-in-law and my husband were the next two Fathers in my life.

My sweet Husband was such a natural dad when our first was born. I was so surprised how perfectly that baby fit in his arms and how easily he adjusted to being a dad. Because he was so eager to bond with this baby, he fed him baby food the first week of his life. He fed him blueberry buckle baby food. Of course my son was NOT interested in nursing, his dad was much more fun. I didn't make it even a month nursing this son. I don't begrudge him of sabotaging me, I understand how excited he was about being his father. It is rather sweet now, because this son's wife makes a big deal of buying the blueberry buckle baby food when they are ready to wean their baby. They wait until we are together then give Grandpa a spoon and the bottle of baby food and allow him to feed the baby the first spoonful of solid food.

My father-in-law was a good dad. My husband was the oldest child, so this was a new thing to have a child get engaged. I felt very welcomed by his parents, and his dad really put on a production of taking pictures of us and making a big deal of our engagement. He was a kind father-in-law to me. He loved his grandchildren and they all loved him.

My Daddy and my father-in-law have both died. I miss them, and sometimes feel their spirits nearby. My father-in-law told us before he died that he was going to apply for Guardian Angel and would be watching over us. I truly believe that God gave him that assignment.

Now we come full circle. All my sons are fathers. One is still awaiting the birth of his first baby, but they all are fathers. Today as they called to wish their dad a Happy Father's day, I wished them the same. You boys had an excellent example of what a wonderful dad is. I know you all love him dearly, and rightly so. I see you carrying on the things your dad did. You are all good young men.

I cannot complete this post without mentioning my in-law sons who are or will be wonderful fathers as well. Thank you, all three of you, for taking such good care of my daughters, for loving them, for providing for them, for being such wonderful dads to my grandchildren.

These men are all heroes. They get up every.single.morning and head off to work. They do this because they want to provide for their families. They do the things we girls can't or don't want to do, and they do it willingly. They stomp on the spiders, reach that thing off the high shelf, they get up in the night with the baby and change it before bringing it to us, they do the hard labor and heavy lifting, among other unpleasant things.

They honor the scripture, Gen. 3:19

"In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground. . ."

The Fathers In My Life are all wonderful men. I am so glad they are all a part my life. I truly feel blessed.

Happy Father's Day to you all.

~a

Sunday Baby Blessing

Sunday we blessed our newest grand daughter. We met at her in-law's beautiful home. I didn't get many pictures, I was too busy seeing my grand children. Sailor usually takes pictures, but I think he was just tired.
All my children but the oldest and his family were there. It was great to have them all. The next baby boy is due tomorrow. Good Luck, S2 and DIL2 My prayers are with you.

D-1's Birthday

All my children were born in January, February and March. The oldest boy and the oldest girl are born in March. The middle boy and girl are born in January and the youngest boy and girl are born in February. There were times, especially as the kids got older and wanted to invite friends, after putting on six birthday parties in three months that I wanted to get a special T-shirt printed for me that said:

I survived
6 Birthday Parties
Before
the end of March!

January, February and March are those bleak months after the festivities and expenses of Christmas are over. The six birthday parties were a wonderful way for us to get through those 90 dreary days. The last birthday of the kids is the last day in March, so by the first of April all the spring flowers are ready to pop and Spring has officially sprung.

And there was NO combining of parties with a theme, like My Little Ponies or Transformers.

No, each month was a boy and a girl, so they each got their own, except for one year when I combined all six birthdays in one big celebration at the skating rink. I allowed them to choose one or two best friends and I made a cake with their names and Happy Birthday all together forming a cross-word puzzle as the decoration.

As each of their birthdays come along, I find myself recalling the day of their birth, so many years ago.

note: If you get bored with labor and delivery stories, then just know that is what this is about. Don't feel obligated to read on. One other thing, all my childbirths were "natural", which means I got NO medication. None, Zip, Zilch! By the last child, the new thing was an epidural, and I wanted to try it, but the anesthetist was out of town, so I missed out on trying that. ::ratz::

With S1 I was in labor for 12 hours from start to birth. You may think, "you wuss, that is NOTHING." But the doctor talked to me later and told me they were doing a print-out on a machine that measured the baby's heart rate and my labor pains on the same paper. He said that my labor pains were so intense that they always jumped way into the baby's heart rate chart for 12 hours. He had never seen labor so intense in his whole life. So I sort of felt justified for crying a bunch. Poor Sailor, his wedding ring is actually oval shaped and he says it is because I squeezed his hand so tight. He wished he had brought a tennis ball for me to squish instead.

By the time S2 came along, I had taken some Lamaze classes and learned to focus on the corner of the room and transfer all my pain and anger to that corner and breathe. I was in labor with him for only 6 hours, and was in the hospital for only 3 before I had him.

I was on a roll. I was excited for the next child, because if they got easier, it was going to be a walk in the park from now on!

If you count the time I started labor at 2 in the morning until she was born, it was only 4 hours. She was born at 5:55 am. But if you count all the days before when I awoke at 2 and had false labor until around 5 for 3-4 nights, it is much more.

But more about that later.

The fourth & fifth children, D2 and D3, were what the Dr called "sunny side up." Both were extremely painful back labor and took 15 and 16 hours. With D2 the labor was so bad, I kept getting up and standing, but the nurses didn't want me walking around, so they kept coming in and saying "Mrs. Annie, get back into bed. You can't be out of bed." I finally stayed in bed, but stood on the bed, because it hurt so terribly bad to be laying down with this labor. That even panicked the nurses more. The doctor finally stripped my membranes for D2 and she came really fast. With D3, I was hoping that would work again, so I asked them to do it again after a while. But instead, I continued to labor 4 more hours and had what they call a "dry birth." MUCH WORSE. This was NOT the way I had hoped for it to work out. Everyone said it gets easier as each successive birth comes. I was breaking the theory, one painful birth at a time.

The last one, S3 took 14 hours, but only 4 in the hospital, and only about 2 of really intense pain. His birth was really not a hard one, just long. We had just moved to a new job and a new town, a month before, and our insurance was due to run out at the end of the month. He was due the 22nd and February only had 28 days. I was so afraid I would go over and insurance wouldn't cover, so I asked the Dr. about it. He said he would strip my membranes on that day if I hadn't had him already. So that morning, we went through the procedure and Sailor and I walked all over this new town we had just moved to. It is only a mile square, eight blocks by eight blocks. When we got home in the afternoon, poor little S2 had spots on his tummy. He was coming down with chicken pox of all things. Not a good time have this happen, and the poor little fellow wasn't allowed into the hospital to hold his baby brother the next day. However they let me take the baby home and be exposed two days later. I never could figure this out. After S2 recovered, the rest of the children came down with it, some overlaping 2 weeks apart. It was a long two months.

Anyway, back to D1's birth. I had been going into false labor every night at around 2am, for about a week before she was actually born. Back then I was ambitious, and made little baby announcements. It was a picture of a little chick still in the egg, but the top of the egg shell is it's hat and it is standing in the bottom shell. This could represent either sex, since we didn't know the gender of the baby. I had drawn the chicks on that stuff you bake and it shrinks. Every night when awakened with the pains, I would draw and bake some little chicks, bake and paste them onto a card on which I had printed: New Arrival! and a place for all the statistics.

I kept myself busy all night long as I felt these labor pains that were strong enough to keep me awake, but not strong enough to wake my husband. Every time I would think to myself that they were getting strong enough, which usually was around 5 in the morning, they would stop abruptly.

I did this for about 3 or 4 nights. By Thursday night/Friday morning, I was getting scared. My husband had gone onto Graveyard shifts Thursday and I was afraid that I might actually need to be taken to the hospital one of these times and he would be 25 miles away at work. Since my other labors had gotten progressively shorter, I figured this one would follow that pattern and I would need him there, not trying to find a substitute (control room at the power plant) and driving 25 miles home. So on Friday morning when he got home from his graveyard shift, we went to see the doctor. With S2 the Doctor had told me that if I went past the due date, he would induce. D3 was 3 days overdue, so I thought the policy still stood. With that policy in mind, I asked him to induce and explained about Sailor's being on a grave yard shift. This made him crabby, and he patiently explained that when "the apple was ripe, it would drop." He would NOT induce. I told him I didn't want to be alone when the "apple dropped", but he wouldn't budge.

Friday night, true to form, I started labor again. But this time it felt a bit more intense. All of the previous nights, I had taken a VERY.HOT.SHOWER with the streams of hot water pounding on my tender belly, and usually it helped. Every night, I spent those 4 hours in prayer, communing with my Heavenly Father and asking for help. This night was no exception. I pleaded for inspiration as to what to do, and I felt his Spirit near me.

But this time the hot shower didn't help. I had run all the hot water out and I still felt terrible. A dear friend had told me to call her if I needed someone to come and tend the kids in the middle of the night, should I start labor.

I thought of my options. If things went like they did the last few nights, this would stop by 5 or so. I didn't want to bother my friend if it was a false alarm. I didn't want to call my husband either.

The pains continued to get worse. They were now 5 minutes apart. But the pain was on my lower left side instead of the center of my tummy. I finally decided to just drive myself to the hospital. After all, I could call my friend and my husband from the hospital if the nurse admitted me, and all would be fine, and I was only 4 miles from the hospital. I checked on the children and said a little prayer, then got into my car and began to drive to the hospital. At the most, it was maybe a 5 minute drive, so I figured they would be safe until I got there to call my friend. Wouldn't it have been nice in those days to have a cell phone? How did we ever get along without them back then? But due to the intense labor pains, instead of taking 5 minutes, it took me 20 minutes. Each time a pain would come, I would stop the car, squeeze my eyes shut, and breathe through the pain, then start back up again, only to be stopped again about 1 1/2 minutes later. The pains were coming hard and fast now.

A nurse examined me and reported that I was NOT in labor. The pain was on the left side was the baby pushing against my bladder (the nurse informed me, hence the pain in that area) and until it could move to the middle and go where it needed to, I would not have this baby. Even though the pains were very close and I was 3 days overdue, she told me she had called the doctor and he had said: "Tell her I WILL NOT INDUCE her." He would not even come in to the hospital, but he did authorize a sedative but the nurse made me take it in front of her, not after I got home. WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? First, knowing I would be driving home with this in my system, and second: That I would administer it to my children when I got home?

I cried on her shoulders, I put my arms around her neck and pleaded for her to just admit me until my husband could come and pick me up. I told her it had taken me 20 minutes to drive those 4 miles. But she was adamant and would not yield. Hind sight and many years of experience tells me NOW that I should have called my friend to go watch the kids, I seated myself in the waiting room and refused to leave. But I was timid and obedient, back then.

Going home was the same, stopping every so often, breathing through the pain and continuing on. It took 20 minutes to get home and by then the sedative had taken effect and labor had stopped. I was ready to just drop peacefully into bed, but what should I find in my bed? My two-year old had found his way into my bed while I had been gone. I had to heft this large toddler back into his bed and he cried a bit when I put him back into his bed. The sedative was no longer effective. I started labor again.

Exasperated by now, I called my husband and told him I had been to the hospital and back, I was not in labor, but the pain was intense, and could he PLEASE COME HOME? Then I got back into the shower to distract me from the pain. As the hot water ran out for the second time that night, I tried to manually take that baby's head and move it to the middle. It did not budge. Then I decided to bear down, like you are supposed to do when you push. . .

oops. I realized to my horror that had done the trick and this baby was ON THE WAY!

Two more pushes and her head had emerged. I noticed the cord around her neck and slipped it over her head. Then she was in my arms. I knew Sailor was coming home, so I just waited, still standing there in the bathtub. I nursed and talked to this beautiful child for a full 5 or 10 minutes before I realized it was a GIRL! Two boys and now a girl!!! I thanked my Heavenly Father for taking care of me and my beautiful baby daughter. I even delivered the placenta and cut the cord before my sweet husband arrived. When he did arrive, it all seemed too quiet. He saw a light coming from the crack of the bathroom door and cautiously opened the door to find me still standing in the tub, but with a baby in my arms.

"Its a girl", I announced.

Poor fellow nearly turned as white as a sheet, and had to lower himself to sit down, so he wouldn't faint. I asked him to take this sweet baby and get her a blanket so she wouldn't get too cold, while I got myself cleaned up and dressed. He said he had to say over and over to himself "blanket, blanket, blanket" in order to remember what I had asked him to do.

After we drove to the hospital and were checked out (miracle of miracles, the doctor was actually there this time) and all was well, was when people began to ask me, "HOW did you do it?" The doctor told me I had done everything right. It was at this point that I broke down and began to sob, realizing what terrible things could have happened to both of us.

Basically my answer was I was guided and directed by a loving Heavenly Father. I prayed for inspiration. I had just read a pamphlet the night before on Emergency Childbirth. I had just seen a movie made by our Church called Man's Search for Happiness. It shows a doctor holding a newborn baby upside down by its feet and stroking its throat, I guess to help the mucus out. I had checked and found the cord around her neck and knew what to do.

My beautiful D1 is now 29 years old, just a few days ago. She suffered no brain damage from the cord around her neck, in fact she is exceptionally bright. She is perfect, just like all the rest of my darling children, and I thank my Heavenly Father for taking such good care of me and my family.

sorry if this was too graphic for you, I had just read a friend's blog titled "How I got this way" and realized that it is times like this in your life that you are effected for the rest of your life.

this is part of how I got this way.

~a

Poetry

My darling Granddaughter wrote some poems and she gave them to me in her handwriting. She is my S1's oldest daughter.
These poems are precious. And I told her that I would put them on my blog. She was excited about that.
She is so amazing for only being 6 years old. So without further adieu. . .

The first is called "Snow"

Snow
white
fluffy
soft
cold
snow.
Silvery
see-through
sparkley
slippery
snow.

When she read that to me, I was amazed a tiny girl her age is writing poetry.

the second one is called "Sky"

Sky

Sky is blue
Sky is green
Sky is pretty
everything

You've seen
Sky is blue
Sky is red
Is Sky purple?
ask your dad.

I saved the "Best" for last. . .
I will write it exactly how she wrote it. She did this on purpose:

Best

am the Best
reader

am the Best
witer
somehow
or outer.

But am not
the Best
spelerr

btw. She is only in 1st grade, and around Christmas her parents learned she is reading at the top level of a 2nd grader who is about to graduate to 3rd grade. Thank goodness for a great school and teacher who is willing to continue to challenge her. Unlike my D1's 2nd grade teacher.

D1 was reading words at age 3. She was reading scriptures with expression so well, by the age of 5 we gave her the Bible we had purchased to give to her on her 8th birthday. She was reading Little House on the Prairie-type books by 1st grade. When I approached the teacher in 2nd grade, asking him to give her harder books, he said he was not allowed. She had to twiddle her thumbs and wait for the class to catch up. It took clear until she was a junior in HS before it caught up with her. She is still very intelligent, I don't think that goes away, just because the teachers don't comply. I quite enjoy her enthusiasm for life and learning.

But to my little grand daughter and to her mom and dad, I salute you. It is such a fun adventure to watch these sweet children grow and become amazing people, isn't it?

May I speak to. . .

note: In the last post, Sailor made a comment and reminded me of something that happened when we were newly weds. Here is what happened. . .

Saturday afternoon:
Sailor is serving at a football game as an *usher for the Elder's Quorum.

*Back in the olden days, when the Church was allowed to do fund-raisers, all sorts of creative ways were discovered to raise money. One was to usher the College football games. He would spend all afternoon standing by a portal, taking tickets and watching to make sure people had paid to get in to see the game.

Meanwhile back at the apartment, I'm watching a tiny black and white TV, usually an old Star Trek rerun and gestating. He was a student at the university. This was our very first fall as a married couple.

Suddenly the phone rings and startles me out of my haze.

Hello? I say.

Hello? May I speak to Sailor? a very cute young girly voice says.

He is not here.

OK, thanks.

15 minutes later:

phone rings again

Hello?

same cute voice says: May I speak to Sailor?

me again, a bit concerned: He is not here, may I take a message?

no that's OK. Bye

15 minutes later:

phone rings AGAIN

Hello?

same cute voice says: May I speak to Sailor?

me now I am becoming alarmed: He is not here, may I take a message?

no that's OK. B'Bye.

hmmmmmmmm. what the . . .?

10 minutes later:

phone rings again!

Hello?

same cute voice again says: May I speak to Sailor?

me again, now I am getting curious and concerned: He is not here.

May.I.take.a.message?

no that's OK.



Finally, she calls again. By now I am agitated.

same cute voice says: May I speak to Sailor?

He still is not here.

She is getting curious as well and asks, Who is this?

My voice has now taken on a frosty tone:

This Is His WIFE

the last word was emphasized with as much ice as I could put into it.

There was an audible gasp!
NO! He can't be married! When did he get married?

We got married last June.
(another gasp)

Are we talking about the same Sailor? 5' 6", blond hair, brown eyes?

No, I reply quite relieved, my Sailor is 6'3" brown hair, blue eyes.

Cute girl giggles sounding nervous yet really relieved.

There can't be two Sailors?

We decided there must be. I was relieved and amused by now.


::jump ahead 4 months::
We have moved to a tiny house by a race horse farm

phone rings (male voice on the other end: May I speak to Sailor?

he is not here, may I take a message?

This is So-and-So from The Insurance Agency. He was in a bicycle accident and I want to talk to him about the specifics.

That cannot possibly be. We live in a tiny house 5 miles out of town, sir. He drives a truck to school.

Is this Sailor's residence?

Yes, it is. I am his wife. He cannot possibly have been in an accident, his bicycle is sitting outside my front window! I am looking at it right now as we speak. I know there are two Sailors in town. You will have to find the other one.

::jump ahead two more months::
we have moved yet again. Now we are living in town in a tiny duplex. I get the mail. A check for the amount of $40 written to Sailor from an insurance company. I remember the bicycle accident.

Now comes the inner dilemma. It is legally written to Sailor. We could easily and legally cash it if we were the dishonest sort, or I will have to do some sleuthing. I am not sure how I found out, but the other person with my husband's name lived in a fraternity house, so he had no listing in the phone book. I finally located him and called. I first asked him if he had been in a bicycle accident, just in case there were more than two people with my husband's name. Then I explained the whole situation. He agreed to come to our house and retrieve the check that was rightfully his. We finally met. I wish I had snapped a picture.

Now if you don't personally know me, you may wonder. But his name is not something common like John Smith. As a matter of fact, before I met Sailor, I had never heard of his last name. According to the chart in the last post, it is the 888th most popular name in the US.

Since I have been married 33 years, I have run into many, many people who say, OH, I know someone with that name. Are you related to. . .?

But in my naive youth, I truly believed there was only one Sailor. And yet, for me, he is THE ONLY ONE. I love you dear Sailor.

Anyway, that's my story. . .and I am sticking to it.

~a

Contemplating my slipperszzzzzzzzzZZZZ

I can't remember when exactly it was that I announced my son was engaged and they had upped the wedding to October from the original plan of June of next year, and I began to sew a dress for the little bride, but it seems like a huge long time ago. I could check back in my blogs, but that would mean saving this and finding my way back out and back into this post, and that could spell disaster, since I get distracted way too easily.

So anyway, he re-met her in July, he had known of her for years as her cousin was his best friend and I think it was August he announced the marriage, and maybe September he announced the change of dates and asked me to make her dress, about two months ago. But since that announcement, my world has been turned upside down with trying to meet deadlines.

Now since all the hoopla is finally over, I am exhausted. My body tried to pull a fast one on me and come down with a cold last week at their reception, but a great trick from DIL-1 worked. Take 2 Mucinex (I use the WM house brand) every four hours along with Sudafed PE. I guess the Mucinex breaks up any mucus, and the Sudafed dries it up. You still have other symptoms, like headache and scratchy throat and extreme tiredness, but you can keep going, especially when you add Excedrin to the mix.
So this last week as I have tried to fight off the cold and continue to get ready for our reception, I continued to make sheet cakes (I made 5 of them and we only used two or three), clean the house, change bed sheets, etc. etc. etc.

The Saturday reception came off without a hitch, thanks to DIL-3's family and my own pitching in to decorate the Cultural Hall, and help with set up and clean up. We got to bed around midnight, I think. Sunday after Church, we came home and my sweetheart made two casseroles from the dutch oven left overs he had made for the crowd the day before. Yes I know, I have the best husband in the WORLD who sweetly cooks for the crowds. I had to conduct our Women's Relief Society meeting on Sunday (being in a counselor in the Presidency~makes me have to do such things) and was gone while everyone else went home.

We all had a delicious dinner and two of the remaining couples (D2 and S3 and spouses) left, and we continued to visit with D2 and her sweetheart until around 5. They looked at the clock and realized it was time to get back as well.

As soon as they left, I turned on the news, because my choir director, Sterling Poulson on Channel 2 does the weekend weather. He is such a very nice man and is married to such a darling lady, Danette who is a Dear Friend to me, and sits by me in choir. So I try watch him. It's always fun because usually when he slips in references to our town, which I have noticed other stations don't even put on their map with a temperature next to it, and sometimes blatantly says stuff that I know refers to me. One time he said on the weather: "And down here in (name of my town) where (my name and my husband's name) live, the temperature is 55 degrees. He has made reference to my town many times, especially for Tuesday when I come up 2 1/2 hours drive to practice in the choir. He will say something like "Now, if you are going to be driving from (my town) today, watch for the rain clouds which will be forming around 4 pm. So drive safely."


Anyway I eased into my lazy-boy, put my feet up and snuggled in. Sweet Friend brought me a blanket and tucked me in, and I warned him that was a dangerous thing to do. Next thing I knew I was out. I think I slept for 3 hours while "watching" TV. My Dear Friend is the one who invented the quote which I used to name this post. She described the hard work her husband had been putting in, and said that Sunday he just collapsed, completely exhausted into his easy chair, and spent the afternoon contemplating his slippers. I cannot think of a better way to put it. ha ha ha ha

Monday was clean-up day. I washed bedsheets, towels, dishes, cleaned etc. etc, Again! Don't you hate when you work all week for company and just after they leave, you have to do it all over again? Even the leaves I raked, mowed and blew with the leaf blower have somehow showed up again. Of course I am not surprised, my neighbor's huge Poplar trees (about 100 feet high) like to hold onto their leaves until the coldest ice and strongest wind forces them off. And so the raking is not just a Saturday afternoon thing, it is an "all Fall" event.

So if you haven't heard from me in a while, this is why. I am just exhausted.

But there is no rest for the wicked, and the righteous don't need it, as my husband is fond of saying. I have a Relief Society Homemaking event on Wednesday which I will make a pot of soup for, and give the rest of the wedding cake to. I have Thanksgiving coming. We will have S2 and family come, so I want to put up the Christmas tree and have presents for the children under there. And I have a concert on my Birthday December 1. After that Christmas is well on its way, and the person whose name I drew probably won't get a completed quilt, like last year and the year before went. But thankfully my understanding children know me and forgive. Last year, the person I drew the year before got theirs, and the current person got a top which I have to finish. They have to develop patience when it comes to my procrastination, I think. Thank you children.

And so life continues. You haven't heard from me in a while because I have been busy, and true to the schedule, it is Tuesday and time to head to choir practice.
I hope you are all having a very nice day.
a

The latest

Recently, we met a new girl who has suddenly come into our lives. She actually has been in the picture for years, but we were never aware of her. The first time I remember spotting her was the Sunday after we got home from our trip to Taiwan, at our Son's Mission Homecoming.
This is an event where he is invited to speak in Sacrament Meeting at Church. Afterwards a celebratory dinner is provided by the family, usually in their home. We had about 60 people that day all there to celebrate S3's successful mission and safe return home.

Returned missionaries sometimes have a very hard time readjusting to civilian life. They are thrust from a totally secure environment away from worldly worries with a thoroughly planned life back into the Real World. For the previous two years, their rules were to stay with their companion 24/7, preach the Gospel, and stay an arms-length away from any member of the opposite sex. With their Mission Release comes worries about school, jobs, insurance, career, a vehicle and dating.

Because summer jobs are hard to find in our small town, most of the High School graduates, College students and Returned Missionaries have to move to larger cities located hundreds of miles away. They have to either live with relatives or rent when they DO find a job, which makes saving for college very difficult. If they find a job in the small town, it makes social life very scarce.

Because he came home from his mission so late in the summer, we felt there would not be very much opportunity for good jobs, so we hired him to paint the house and shop for us, and he has been doing an excellent job.
Because of this employment, his social life was not too active, except when his friends came back to town for Independence Day and some weekends.

Among the well-wishers who came to celebrate his Homecoming, was his long-time Best Friend, (BF) who was en route home from a cousin's wedding in a neighboring state. Tagging along with BF and his wife were a string of cute girl cousins. At our celebration, BF explained that this cousin's family was having two weddings three weeks apart. The brother had just gotten married last week, and in two weeks, the sister was getting married. They invited S3 to come help celebrate at the reception. It was to be held in a town about an hour and a half away.

So two weeks after he got home, S3 ventured out on his own for the first time to attend this wedding. While at the reception, he met, or should I say made a re-acquaintance with, BF's cousin, Cute Girl, who when they were children, used to be the younger tag-along sister the cousins used to ditch, when he would go with BF for a week at their Grandma's house in the summers.

It was Cute Girl's sister's wedding S3 was attending. For some reason, this couple held their open house/reception on Friday, got married Saturday in the temple, and came back to Grandma's for a lunch and to open presents.

Anyway back to S3 and the cute girl: She had sworn off boys in general two years ago after a traumatic experience with boys and was still in that mode when he approached her and asked her to dance. She said she found herself thinking NO but to her great surprise she heard herself saying YES.

They danced and as they talked afterward, they discovered much in common. He called home that night and said he wanted to go to the wedding the next morning, so he wouldn't be home tonight. Besides, he claimed, he had gone to visit with his friend BF who had to work Friday and wasn't actually coming until the next day. He didn't tell me this, but really he wanted to get to know Cute Girl a bit better.

The next day after the wedding, S3 and Cute Girl got even more acquainted as they walked and talked some more, and I fear BF STILL didn't get visited.
But S3 came home all smiles, and announced sweetly that he had met a girl. . .


Now as I write this, it has been a month since that first dance. Things have escalated quite a bit. Two weeks later, after several trips to her home, and many talks on the phone, he announced, was that they had talked and had decided they were "going together". He has been back to pick her up and take her to meet his now-returned Mission President and his wife. The next Thursday, she drove over here to meet us. We took her out to the West Desert to target practice on innocent cans.

On our way out to the desert, I told CG our story about how everything good that had happened to us was accompanied with rain. S3 and CG recalled that it was raining when they had decided they were "going together".
On our way home, she told us that her parents just loved S3 and had for a long time, ever since he was a small boy and came with BF to visit his cousins and grandparents. That night, we ate dinner, then retired to the porch to watch the rain storm which lasted couple of hours.

The next morning as S3 was getting ready for a job interview 100 miles away, he asked his dad what he thought of CG.
After agreeing that she was really something special, the conversation went something like this:
Sailor: So, are we going to be hearing about an upcoming EVENT soon?
S3: Huh? (Trying to appear innocent and naive).
Sailor: You know, December is really busy and a hard time to have an EVENT. Are you going to announce an EVENT in December?
S3::looking sheepish because he had known what his dad was hinting at:: "Well, we haven't discussed this"
Sailor, being well-seasoned from 5 previous children's marriages said: Well, just so you know, these things take some warning and preparation time. The other siblings need some "heads up" time in order to arrange their finances and time off, etc.
S3: We are probably going to talk about that after our first semester in school.
Sailor: Oh and April is the Outage at the Plant. I Cannot get that time off, so please Not April.
S3: okay
Sailor: I am pretty sure you will probably be announcing this sometime in the future, so just so you and she know these are two times that are really hard to arrange.
S3: (this time not so naive) OK, thanks for the warning, Dad.

I never would have been able to put it so simply or straight-forward as the Sailor, but I appreciate this Father-Son talk they had.

::Annie gears up mentally for yet One More special Event::

more later. . .
August 17
S3 came home for the weekend, but it turns out that he only stayed here a minute and really he said he was going to a Family Reunion for Cute Girl's family.
So I was sitting outside visiting with S3 while he was painting trim on the YET-TO-BE-FINISHED paint job.
He had told us earlier that he and CG were probably going to date others while they were attending their separate schools 2 hours from each other. This really bothered me, since I felt he already knew that she was the best thing that had ever happened to him

I said: "I don't think it is such a great idea to date anyone else." He gets the cutest grin on his face and says, OH?
I explain that he has already found such a perfect match, why would he want to get to know anyone else?
He said they had discussed this and think the same. I said, then, the next step is to ask her to marry you. Have you asked her to marry you?
::Shakes his head with a silly grin::
MOM you always know me SO WELL. How do you do it?
So? Have you set a date? Is it June?
::Incredulous:: HOW DID YOU KNOW?
I don't know, seems like a good time, what date? the 17th?
::MOUTH OPEN:: HOW DID YOU KNOW?
I listen to you. You told me the number 17 has significance for you both, it HAS to be that day.
He admits that really they already purchased the ring, and he was on his way to their house, not for a family reunion, but to ask her father for her hand. He was trying to keep it all a secret, and wouldn't have said a word, but because I asked, he felt he wanted to tell us.

Later in the evening as S3 is talking on the phone to CG, he hands me the phone and asks me to tell her about the previous conversation.
As I am recalling this conversation to her, I realize that June 17 is THE DAY I GOT MY RING all those years ago! We had purchased it on the 9th, and it was was getting resized. The next Sunday, the 17th, Sweet Friend (Sailor) asked my dad for my hand, then placed that ring on my finger in front of them. WOW. It never had significance, because he had actually asked me to marry him several weeks before on his birthday, so that is the day I counted.

And now, as Paul Harvey likes to say: Here is the Rest Of The Story: Her Story:

Ever since she was a young girl, about 12, she always had a huge crush on S3. She and her cousins have teased each other that some day one of them would marry him. She decided, at a very young age, that she would like to be The One. As she grew up and went through various boyfriend problems and breakups, she said it was thinking of him that helped her to get past these sad times.

She also told me that she had felt an urgency to make sure she came to his Mission Homecoming, but had no idea when he got back or when the Homecoming was. By pure coincidence when they were on their way home from her brother's wedding in a neighboring state, she was somehow shifted to a different car, which, by the way was going to detour through (our town) to S3's Homecoming.

Because of her long-time crush, and sweet wish to be his bride, she said she was petrified she might say something stupid and blow the whole thing, and ended up not saying a word to him while here. Then she heard her cousins inviting him to the other wedding, and again, she was terrified she would blow it and do something stupid. In her fear, she avoided him. But it all worked out, because he approached her, and asked her to dance. . .
. . .and that is The Rest Of The Story.

In retrospect, she chased him until he caught her. Isn't that how it goes much of the time? And, he asked her dad for her hand on. . .
. . .the 17th.

one more thing. . . from the time our children were tiny, we began to include their future spouses in our family prayers. We prayed they would be raised in good families, they would desire a temple marriage, and they would be kept safe. It is amazing to know she was in our perimeter from the time S3 met BF and became best friends.

SO I am getting ready for one more special EVENT to happen in this family. I am so pleased. We all LOVE Cute Girl. She is darling.

25 August
S3 and CG were here for the weekend. He had gotten the ring sized and brought it to her when he picked her up yesterday. He took her to the hill where the Temple stands, and then he got out his guitar and played
Beloved One
and sang it to her (which is really rare to hear him sing), then he got on one knee, and said, "(her name), will you marry me?"
She could only nod through her tears. She is such a darling girl.

Lumpy

When our third son, S3 was about 11, we discovered a lump under his arm. After the doctor looked at it, he declared it was an osteochondroma, or bone tumor. This worried us for a bit until they told us it was just a tiny cell that was part of growth plate that got lost back when he was a fetus. And now it was trying to grow another arm out sideways. Shortly after that we discovered a strange lump in his eye. The doctor told us this was an epi-orbital dermoid, a little cell that thinks it is skin, so it grows hair, sweat glands and sometimes teeth. It too was a cell that got lost when he was a fetus. His only had a tiny row of eyelashes. We discovered it one day he asked me to look and see if I could spot an eyelash in his eye. It was a white round thing about the size of the top of your pinkie finger.
More recently, while he was on his mission, he had a knee injury, and they took an x-ray, and realized he had one more bone growth on his leg, between the two bones. The doctor told him he had a lump, and S3 said, "don't tell me, let me guess, is it an osteochondroma?" The doctor was very surprised and said "yes!" Again it was a tiny bone cell from the growth plate that had gotten lost and was trying to grow another leg bone. We had the first osteochondroma removed, and the epiorbital dermoid was removed shortly after that. But the leg one, the Dr. said didn't need removal unless it began to interfere with his tibia and fibula.
We were discussing the lumps this morning, and how they had gotten lost on their way to form him, when S3 suddenly laughed and commented it somehow seems typical. He said, "I started out distracted even before I was formed. My cells got distracted, and pretty soon, whichever cell was in charge said, 'Hey, find a seat, you can't just be floating around. Hurry! Sit Down!' So the cells grabbed any seat, and that is where they landed."
As a side note, one day the radio station was announcing for anyone to call in and tell us of the weird things they found in their bodies. I got on the phone. The other contestants mentioned a fly larvae under the skin in their knee, and a cockroach in this guys ear. S3 won, the disc jockies decided, because after all, the prize was to Disneyland, and he was a little boy.
So just after S2 came home from his mission, and D1 finished her chemo and radiation, we all got into the van and drove to California to go to Disneyland. Free tickets for 8 for one day, and my older sister and her family joined us since she lived in California. With our son barely home from his mission, our daughter a survivor of cancer, and the third son a survivor of lumps that weren't cancer, we had a wonderful celebration of life, that day in Disneyland, and every day since.

Getting ready for company. . . again

As the time draws closer to our departure to Taiwan to pick up our Missionary son, I look around and realize that the very next day when we get home, we will have several sets of siblings landing here, like a circling sea gulls over a freshly plowed field.
Not that Guitar RM Boy is a bug, mind you, but a great treat the siblings have all been patiently waiting for to return home.
So I look at all the once-occupied bedrooms in this great house and realize that they have been sadly neglected. I should hire a maid to come in and dust, vacuum and freshen the sheets from time to time.
The joyous thought that all six of my children will be gathered here, for the first time in I don't know how many years, on Saturday and Sunday after his Mission report spurs me into looking at those abandoned bedrooms through "company eyes".
I love when my mom has prepared my old room with fresh sheets, blankets, and a fresh coat of end dust. In the winter, near Christmas, she decorates the rooms with tiny Christmas trees with lights. Her house always looks so cheerful and hospitable.