Sunday, June 29, 2008

Jack woke up and immediately cleaned his room in hopes of earning the new Lego set. Performance day for the choir. We had on last rehearsal before church, and then we were on. It made me laugh to see that the choir is really more than twice as big as it ever was during practices. But I think we pulled it off! We usually sit in one of the very back rows at church and no one ever sings the hymns back there. It was nice to be in the middle of a bunch of people who love to sing out! We had a special program in Primary that ran a bit short and we didn't have our pianist there so I pitched in and played with one finger. After church Roger gave Jack the Lego set. Jack spent the entire afternoon and evening building and playing with it. I started feeling a bit under the weather. Sinus headache. So after a bit I took to my bed and took a three-hour nap! When it was time to go to sleep at night I was wide awake and read into the wee hours of the morning.

Saturday, June 28, 2008

I spent hours and hours today in the dusty basement of the Springville Museum of Art taking year-end inventory for the museum store. I didn't finish. It was a bigger project than I expected because they have hundreds of copies of old exhibition catalogs tucked away down there. I've ordered some boxes to help reorganize them all so inventory will be better protected and much easier to count next year. Roger and Jack spent lots of time together today, cutting down dead branches, going to Roger's office to clean up (Jack got to shred lots of paper), visiting Roger's parents. And going to Target, where they bought an Indiana Jones Lego set. But Jack has to do more work to earn it. He picked up all of his toys and has to clean his room tomorrow. We started a new family tradition - a weekly fire to burn up our stash of dead branches. Then baths and showers for everyone in the family!

Friday, June 25, 2008

I'm trying to think of anything we did today out of the ordinary. Jack and I cleaned the half bath. I don't think I'm going to have him do mirrors for a while. Too much cleaner goes missing! A bit of other cleaning, a few loads of laundry, a bit of officework. I took a big load of books orders to the post office. At the invitation of my friend Karen I set up an account at Goodreads (I'll blog about it if and when I actually write about any books I've read). Roger and I left Jack with Johnny and Benny and went out for dinner. Jack and I spent some good time together later in the evening. I am increasingly worried that one of his friends consistently makes him feel stupid. That's not okay at all.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Jack woke up on the wrong side of the bed (I think he's had a bit too much of a good thing playing with friends nearly every waking hour). So instead of letting him play with friends, I decided he needed some good one-on-one time with mom, so I dragged him on errands. Costco, OfficeMax and a local furniture store to talk to the manager about helping out with a reading area for the art exhibit. By the time we were done, Jack's mood had improved dramatically. Rex came over, and we went to the reservoir for the afternoon. Lots of hot sun and cold water. I went to half an hour of an emergency choir practice (we're singing Sunday), then headed to book club (I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith). We watched the movie and talked until midnight! Oh, and the high school principal called. I got the library job!

Wednesday, June 25, 2005

I woke up early, anxious about my brother's house (we've been trying to resurrect the deal we thought was dead, and I am suspecting it really is dead now). I don't want to be anxious about my brother's house. It's not like I have any control over the situation. Anyway, I took care of some things and then went back to bed and took a midmorning nap while Jack hung out with friends. Our job today was to sort through and put away all of the dvds and wii game disks that have been out and about. Tonight I went to a meeting about the exhibition I'm working on. Instead of meeting at the museum, we met at the Art City Trolley for dinner. Very pleasant. Then grocery shopping. Wednesday evening is a bad night to shop. The shelves were pretty bare, and I wasn't able to get everything I needed.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

We got up really, really early to get Jack off to Cub Scout Day Camp by 7:15. As soon as he got home, he hooked up with friends and played until dark! He doesn't like anything to take away time from friends. I spoke on the phone with pop-up book artist David Carter who will be participating in the museum exhibition. While I was out running errands I ran into a neighbor who is selling her house because her husband walked out on her. We had a good talk, and it sounds like she's starting to get her footing again. I don't really know her all that well, she's really just an acquaintance, but I wanted to be sure she knew we were rooting for her. I attended my first meeting for a group that has organized to help get the bond passed in November for our new library. Wow! That's going to be a bit of a ride.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Before Jack hooked up with friends for a marathon day of play, we cleaned out the floor of the pantry, washed it, and reorganized all of the things we store there. Jack stuffed all of the plastic grocery bags we've been collecting into a big bag to return to the store for recycling (I really am going to invest in a large enough set of canvas bags to handle our weekly trips to the store!). My friend Diana stopped by for a visit. I made major headway on my art exhibit project, sending out a list of information I need from all of the artists (25 participating for sure, a couple I'm still trying to track down). I also made major headway cleaning out the area outside my basement office where I put the books I've got listed for sale online, but which has mostly become a dumping area for things I don't want to deal with.

Sunday, June 22. 2008

Church, with a few clandestine trips home to get things I forgot to bring with me. Stayed after for choir practice and hitched a ride home with my friend Tina and her family. Filled a few book orders, filled out a complicated form for cub scout day camp (I need to work on my bad attitude about the bureaucracy of scouts), ordered the face lotion I swear by (Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizer) online because I got a free shipping code that expires today. Roger and Jack made Rice Krispie treats and between us we ate the whole pan. In the evening we went to Roger's parent's house for a family get together. His brother Jim is in town to meet his daugher's (unofficial) fiance.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Jack was extremely busy all day with friends, putting together a lemonade stand, fighting massive water battles, flooding the sandbox, etc. I didn't have a very exciting day, but I did plow through a bunch of mundane tasks. Entering books to sell online, filling orders, working on a few projects for Primary, cleaning (fresh sheets to sleep in tonight!), shouting out random instructions to Jack and his friends ("No squirt guns in the house!"). One of the more interesting things I did was listen to a podcast on the KRCL website about keeping chickens in the yard (apparently it's legal in Salt Lake City, but not legal in Salt Lake County). Someday I'll have to try fresh eggs.

Friday, June 20, 2008

I woke up at 5:00 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep so I got up and got all sorts of things done. After Jack got up, we had a long battle to get Lego picked up so we could vacuum. Jack kept stopping to build things. Jack went off to Josh K's house while I met up with two sisters-in-law, mother-in-law and a niece to see the Spring Salon exhibition at the museum and have lunch. Last swimming lesson. Jack spent the rest of the day with friends next door (they have a huge inflatable water slide/kiddie pool!) and at here at our house. At dusk, we built a fire in our portable fire pit and invited neighbors over to toast marshmallows in honor of summer solstice. It was wild and windy and the fire sparked a lot because we burned branches from our Christmas tree. A bit of pagan irony.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Had Jack clean the big mirror in our bathroom before heading off to Rex's house. He worked so hard to get all of the spots (teethbrushing in our house is apparently quite vigorous!) that I couldn't bear to point out all of the streaks (I just redid it when he wasn't around). Went to a job interview at the high school for a part time position in the library. Met with the principal and new vice principal, both very pleasant people. I stayed to talk with a few friends who work there for a while. The place is very relaxed without any students! Swimming lessons, post office (sent off books sold through Alibris plus a couple of thank you gifts and finally returned a defective shirt to Land's End that has been sitting in my office for a year and a half!). Jack and his friends hauled every empty box they could find out to the front yard and made a big fort. Bike ride at sunset is becoming a daily ritual.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Cleaning and organizing my office continued. I'm pretty much down to organizing files at this point. Jack practiced lots of back stroke in swimming lessons and was the best at treading water among the boys in his class (I chalk that up to lots of swimming in water over his head at Lake Geneva). Over the course of the day Jack had six different friends over! The latest game is tying a rope to a branch on our maple tree and swinging on it like a vine (Indiana Jones influence). I went to choir practice tonight (usually on Sundays, but postponed due to Father's Day) and then late night grocery shopping.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

I biked Jack to cub scouts this morning then took a turn around the neighborhood and stopped to talk with a few neighbors who were out and about. Early afternoon swimming lessons, then Jack and I swept and hosed down the front steps and walk. Jack had friends in and out all day, and I bit the bullet and started a deep clean and major reorganization of my office. I'm not done yet, but I'm feeling freer already. Ever since we closed the book store, I have felt weighed down by all of the stuff we brought home and that I still need to deal with. I don't want it to weigh me down anymore. As it was getting dark, I decided to take another turn on my bike around the neighborhood and I stopped an talked with a few neighbors who were out and about.

Monday, June 16, 2008

My lazy Sunday spilled over to a fairly unproductive Monday. Because of my afternoon nap on Sunday, I stayed up really, really, really late reading. And Jack has had a cold. So the two of us slept until nearly 10:00. The day was spent getting things done here and there - a few loads of laundry, cutting up our first watermelon of the summer, paying some bills, talking with one of the artists in my fall museum exhibition. We did get out of the house for a bit because Jack started swimming lessons today. He's taking lessons at a private pool, and so far I'm very impressed with his teacher. I think he'll make good progress on his strokes this week.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

A quiet, uneventful Sunday. We go to church at 11:00 so Sunday mornings are relaxed (well, not for Roger, who has to go to leadership meetings). Then we got home, had lunch, and I stretched out for an afternoon nap. When I got up I watched the last bit of U.S. Open golf. We called Grandpa and Gramps for Father's Day. We hung out. Yep, a pretty uneventful day.

Saturday, June 14, 2008

We packed a picnic lunch and went on an adventure today. Roger and Jack wanted to hunt for trilobites, so they loaded up the car with chisels and sledge hammers and we drove to a quarry near Delta, Utah. At $28 per adult for two hours of digging, I opted to set up my folding chair in a bit of shade next to the sign-in shack and read. The boys found at least a dozen really well preserved fossils in the limestone shale. To avoid back tracking, we took a different road home, and it turned out to be a bit of a wild roller coaster ride. We saw quite a few antelope out there among the sagebrush. Art City Days ended tonight with a spectacular fireworks display that we watch every year from our neighbor's front yard.

Friday, June 13, 2008

An utterly out-of-the-rut day. Jack and I got up early and went down to the art museum to set up a museum store annex as part of the Art City Days children's art festival. We hauled books, SMA t-shirts and hats, and other items outdoors and set up shop under a canopy. Our friend Shelley, who worked at our bookstore for many years, came and helped us all day. We didn't sell much (visibility was the main goal), but we had perfect weather and we had fun watching hundreds and hundreds of kids visit dozens of arts and crafts booths all around us. Jack ran off to explore the festival with several different friends from school, and we visited with friends who dropped by our booth. All in all, a very satisfying way to spend our time.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Art City Days is in full swing. Gracie, her mom and little brother and sister came to visit us today and we enjoyed a few hours in the sun at Fun-o-Rama. It's held every year at a nearby park and includes huge inflatable slides, a magic show, and other fun stuff. We had a late lunch when we got home, then after Gracie's family left we picked up Johnny and Benny. The deal on my brother's house has pretty much fallen through, but isn't dead yet. I went to a library board meeting at the city building. As I left I noticed that the lines for rides at the carnival were basically nonexistent so I went home, picked up Jack and Roger and we went down to use up the rest of Jack's tickets. And to enjoy more scones.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Today started out like a pretty normal day. I hung out reading in bed while Jack slept in and finished a journal that Richard Bushman kept during the aftermath of the release of his Joseph Smith biography Rough Stone Rolling. When Jack woke up, we tackled our daily job straightaway: scrubbing the big tub in our bathroom, which had plenty of bubble bath buildup from Jack's marathon baths. Jack played and eventually hooked up with friends. I worked on getting various projects done like typing up library board minutes. We spent the evening at the Art City Days carnival downtown. It was absolutely packed with lines of people! Jack ended up going on only two rides, and I spent at least half an hour in line for the traditional Kiwanis club scone! When we got home, there were cars just stopped on the road in front of our house. At first I was afraid someone had been hit, but it turned out a moose was camping out in our neighbor's yard!

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Jack went on a cub scout field trip to the BYU Bean Museum (natural history) this morning and I had a field trip to the airport to pick up my sister-in-law this afternoon, which took a bit longer than expected because her luggage didn't show up. Roger and Jack cut dead branches off some of our trees for Jack's daily job while I went to the grocery store. On my way home, I took another field trip to see the new wind farm at the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon. Eight wind mills. I can see them whenever I'm out and about and they fill me with such hope for the future and our ability to embrace renewable energy.

Monday, June 9, 2008

We actually arranged ahead of time for one of Jack's friends to come over for the day--a friend who used to live in the neighborhood but who now lives about 45 minutes away. For our extra job today, we loaded up the car with bags of crushed aluminum cans and took them to the recyclers. We got $14.30 for our efforts. I gave Jack a few dollars because he recently took over can crushing duties and then offered him the job. If he takes care of all can crushing, hauling bags, etc. without being asked, he can earn all of the money we get from the recylers. We spent more than two hours at a new playground this evening, partly waiting for a school friend we heard would be there. He never showed up but we had fun anyway.

Sunday, June 8, 2008

A beautiful morning driving up to Salt Lake City to hear our nephew Eric speak in church. He recently came home from a mission in Indiana. We had lunch afterwards in his parents' backyard in the Avenues. Perfect weather, tasty food and pleasant company. Later in the afternoon Jack had a crisis of conscience. He'd made some mistakes and needed to set some things straight. We spent several hours working on it and I could sense his spirit getting lighter and lighter as he made amends. I was proud of him for coming to me, looking me straight in the eye, and getting it all off his chest. He reported later that the horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach was pretty much gone. I hope the lesson he learned sticks.

Saturday, June 7, 2008

We've been planning all week to take Jack to the new Indiana Jones movie. This morning he woke up and decided he didn't want to go. No reason. So we didn't go. Instead we went on a long bike ride delivering the thank you notes he wrote earlier this week and read many chapters in the latest Percy Jackson novel (Percy is a modern day son of Poseidon who goes on quests to help save Olympus). I worked on some stuff for Primary - a regular part of my job as secretary involves reminding kids who have been assigned to share scriptures, give talks and say prayers and to make new assignments to pass out for the next week. I also enjoyed listening to Hillary Clinton's speech suspending her campaign. I thought it was a fabulous speech, and I loved the line about 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling. Not a hugely productive day, but I made better food choices!

Friday, June 6, 2008

Not a very exciting day. Weeding and scrubbing the laundry room floor (after vacuuming up an embarrassing amount of dryer lint) were our jobs of the day. We made a counteroffer on my brother's house. I expect we'll hear something back by Monday. It would be such a relief on so many levels if this deal goes through. I got a call to set up an interview for the job at the high school library job--it'll be in about two weeks. While Johnny and Benny were here at the house, Roger and I left Jack and went out to dinner. Got caught up on "So You Think You Can Dance?" which I got sucked into because I miss watching American Idol.

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Rainy and cold. Worked in pajamas most of the day. Back and forth with brother, realtor, attorney on how to handle counteroffer. It's a bit tricky because the buyer is requesting part seller financing. Always a risk, but so is foreclosure. It took a few threats to wrangle Jack into cleaning up all of the Lego, etc. so I could vacuum the family room but we did it! Ten minutes later there was Lego all over the floor again. Made more bad eating choices today. I'm clearly at the mercy of stress. But feeling much relief now that Hillary has announced she will concede the primary to Barack.

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Received an offer on the house I'm trying to sell for my brother in Boston. He's been in Africa for more than two years, and I doubt he'll ever be back. Feeling that antsy will it all come together feeling. Jack and I went through his shirt drawer to weed out the shirts that are too small. He does not like trying on clothes! Went to a meeting at the art museum about the upcoming children's art festival. I'll be running a museum store annex outside for the day. Got a call asking me to be on the organizing committee to help get a bond passed in November to build a new city library. Made very poor food choices.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

While Jack was at Cub Scouts this morning, I picked up our preordered copy of the Lego Indiana Jones Wii game. Jack had no less than four friends over during the course of the day to play it with him. He ultimately left the game to build an Indiana Jones inspired temple with Lego. I did tear him away to write long overdue thank you notes for his birthday presents. I was inspired today by my high school friend Wendy who is training for a triathlon. I honored her by making a donation in her name for cancer research and by going on a bike ride. I was also inspired by Barack Obama's speech in which he claimed the nomination for the Democrats. I might honor him by making my first ever donation to a presidential campaign.

Monday, June 2, 2008

Trying to follow through on giving Jack a substantive daily job. Today we cleaned a bathroom together. Jack did an extra good job on the toilet bowl. Got a phone call from Lily Toy Hong, a children's book illustrator I'm hoping to include in an exhibition I'm putting together. She's in! Lunch with Wendy, Virlie and Judy. Three fabulous hours of good friends and good lobster bisque soup. An hour reading to Jack under the aspen trees in our yard. Perfect, perfect temperature today! Family night involved a huge stockup at Costco with followup trip to Target since we were in the neighborhood.

My Micro Diary

I used to write in my journal all the time. Now I hardly ever do. Lots of details lost forever. If I just write a few sentences, or even words, a day, maybe I'll remember more of the life I've lived.