You're Gonna Miss This-Part Two

Back in 2007-2008, Country singer, Trace Adkins came out with a song (yes I listen to country, settle down) called, You're Gonna Miss This. The song coincided with a bunch of big changes in my/our lives: Kelsey was graduating, Kris was going down to Oregon to finish school, and was engaged. . . and I was still trying to recover from the rapid moves/losses/craziness of the years between October, 2005 (when Kameron was diagnosed) to then.

Now I find myself trying to reconcile all that stuff, all those years, and despite the extreme toughness of them, I find that I do, in fact, miss that.

I miss the Big House on Vollmer Road; the crazy Colorado weather (I mean, blizzards in October? Ice storms in July?); the space we had - antelopes and falcons and coyotes - o my! I miss the excitement of the kids and the challenge of taking care of all of them (at one point, I think we had three adults and at least twelve kids); I miss middle-school football with Kris; driving all over the state to watch Kelsey at a gymnastics meet; I miss my dog, Cody (best yellow lab EVER); I miss the quiet Colorado morning when the sun was just coming up and the huge house was still and everything seemed possible. . . I miss it.

It's funny how life can seem so crazy and hard while you're living it, but when you look back, they were some great times. Maybe the goal is to keep remembering that each day. Today is that day - the one you're gonna miss. Peace, peeps.

What I Did on My Summer "Vacation"

Well people, the long summer has ended and the children are scampering back to school. Maybe not scampering, but they are getting on the bus and going. One way or the other.

And now:

LET THE WILD RUMPUS START!!!!!!!

But, really. . . its time to buckle down and get all those waiting projects going, and um, start that ahh . . .

NOPE: What's that time? What is the time? Tick-tick-tock, it's party o'clock!...

What DID we do on our summer vacation? 'Cause, really, that's the question here. People with children don't have summer vacation, per se. They have children. They have activity plans. They have camps and trips to movies, and maybe summer school - if they're lucky. They have lots of mental exercise trying to keep their kiddos occupado, out of trouble, and out of their hair.

We also spend a lot of time on the train to Crazytown.

If you have teens, you probably have even more stress. What is little Susie doing at the mall? Is she really at the mall? Is she texting while driving that car you bought her? Worse. . . is she "sexting"? And what the heck is that, anyway? Do they still have Raves??

It boggles the mind and feeds the worry machine.

For those of us "lucky" enough to stay at home with our little dears, there are other concerns: Will I survive the next three months? Will the children? Do I care if the children survive? It would certainly cut down on the back-to-school expenses. . .

But really, for our little krew, this was a pretty decent summer. We had Miss Kelsey home from college for most of it, and you all know I loved that. It will probably be her last one home. She's planning on getting an apartment with one of her roomies next summer. Thankfully, she will be pretty close by, but still. . .ah, but that's next year. Why borrow stress that's almost a whole twelve months away? I have plenty of worry for today.

Besides, I think I might (key word: might)be adjusting to this having adult children thing. As most of you know, my baby boy got married (see multiple posts on this one), and, although I cried copious amounts, I did not perish. And, I am actually very happy for them both. Really. REALLY.

Kelsey went on a road trip from Washington to California with some of her roommates, and I didn't freak out when she neglected to call me - well, I think she checked in twice - I survived it. 'Course, she got a speeding ticket, and she wouldn't have if she'd listened to my voice echoing in her brain to slow down and drive safely. But, they all made it home intact. And a good time was had by all.

I made a decision (again) to downsize and clean up and get organized. Am I alone in this? We Americans are insane consumers. We pay for places to keep our junk. We treasure it, as if we'll miss out on some essential part of life if we toss those pans we bought at Wal-Mart fifteen years ago. George Carlin did a bit on this phenomenon (disclaimer: it's a little raw, after all, it is George Carlin).

In light of this decision, I asked two of Kris's BFFs and groomsmen to come out and assist. Wes and Dustin had some free time and came out for a few weeks. It was terrific fun and they helped me get some big ticket stuff done - moving furniture out, rearranging rooms and appliances, some minor repairs, AND they mowed the lawn for me - WOOT!!

In exchange, I gave them some tours of Seattle at her finest, a few beers, introduced them to some of our AWESOME food, and they got to run down to Oregon and visit with the Newlyweds for a few days.

Oh, by the way, they are terrific cooks and made many meals for the kids and me - another big WOOT! I could totally get used to having someone cook for me. Foot rubs would be nice, too.

We had Elesha visit several times, a few friends drop by, Kobi had two weeks at Drama Camp (go figure), Kameron got to ride a really cool adapted bike at therapy, we all managed to tolerate Klaryssia's non-stop talk about being a senior this year at high school . . . did too much DQ, baked in the unusually hot Seattle summer, BBQ'd a couple of times, and generally had some good times.

And then, the capstone of summer: the first day of school!

The kids survived, despite their valiant efforts to make me hurt them with their tactics of arguing, fighting, whining, grumping, and general loudness.

And so did I.

Now: LET THE WILD RUMPUS START!!

Oh, one more thing I did on my Summer Vacation: I re-discovered Craigslist. The world's biggest garage sale. Now, I can sell my stuff. And buy more stuff.

Uh oh.

Sunday Afternoon Chores

So we mowed the lawn yesterday. I say we because, in my family, it takes a village to mow a lawn. Klaryssia appointed herself picker-upper of the shorn grass; Andrew (the youngest) manned the rake; Kameron (my nine year-old who doesn't walk yet) kept a watchful eye on the mower - because he LOVES LOVES LOVES loud, noisy machines, like vacuums and motorcycles - and Kobi? My eight year old manikin head-loving son? Well, Kobi was dressed for church in his light-colored khakis, white kicks, and his snazzy button-up short-sleeved shirt. Not exactly yard work attire, but Kobi rolls like that. I expect that he will be one of those guys who sends his jeans to the dry cleaners so they get a good crease. Seriously, he folds his jammies BEFORE he puts them on. Really. I'm not kidding here.

Anyway, back to the lawn.

In a perfect world, I like to do this job during the week when the kids are in school. The reasons for that will become apparent. This time, however, I had a few complications. First of all, this is Seattle, and no matter what I say, it does rain a lot. So the challenge is, of course, to find a non-rainy day. It's helpful if this non-rainy day falls on a day when I actually am home in order to mow. Often, this is enough to keep me from mowing for weeks. A fact that bugs the HECK out of me.

So, the first chance I got, I dashed to the garage to whip out the mower. Unfortunately, I forgot that last summer my big awesome mower croaked. No funds to repair. Okay, so back-up mower. No gas. Okay, so I'll go get gas. No money. Hummm. This is delay numero dos.

A few days later, I had money and got the gas (well, actually I sent Kelsey to get the gas since she was over at the house for something). Unfortunately, it was late in the day, kids came home, homework, toileting (Kameron), blah blah - no mowing.

Next day. I am planning on working after I get the mowing done. It rained.

And so it goes until yesterday. It was Sunday, but we didn't go to church because little Andrew has yet another cold and the Swine Flu has everyone super-enforcing their sick policies, darn them. No sneaking him into the nursery, no church. And so, voila, mowing day.

One little problemo - all this rain and lack of mowing leads to. . . you guessed it! A very tall lawn! And, since it rained Saturday (see post below), it was long, wet grass. Kinda hard to mow in the first place. But hey, I'm freaking super-mom (ha), so we WILL mow this grass. My plan was to sneak out back while the boys were out front and get 'er done. Unfortunately, mowers are a little loud, and they are a lot curious. They were back there seconds after I got the mower going.

Next problemo: the mower has no grass catcher. The wet, long, grass proceeded to jam up the blade on the mower. Like on the very first pass. Stop, open the little hatch, pull all the cut grass out, set the blade free, pull the cord, start the mower up again. Next pass. . . sputters to a stop. Open the hatch, pull all the cut grass out, set the blade free, pull the cord, start the mower up again. I am not kidding, the mower got jammed every single pass. At one point, it didn't even make it that far.

Now, while I am quoting "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" in my mind, and sweating like a monkey (if they sweat), I have my four little "helpers" helping me.

Klaryssia is shouting over the mower at me (like I can hear), grabbing up the grass as I toss it out from the little hatch, and walking about two inches behind me. I can't hear her, so when I back up to try to free the blade, I knock her down. I lost track of how many times this happened.

Andrew is holding the rake, which is probably four times taller than him, and flailing about trying to rake up grass I haven't cut yet. He's also helping by knocking the heads off all the pretty white dandilion "flowers". Woo Hoo, he's planting future weeds for me.

Kobi starts out picking up some of the grass, gets bored, starts climbing on the steps to the gazebo and jumping off the rail. Right where I'm mowing. After I scream a few times, he gets the picture and helps by going off to ride his bike. Yay. One down. Meanwhile, Kameron (who I left in the front yard with a basketball), has managed to make his way through the side yard, over rocks and through natural hazards to appear in the back yard. The siren call of the mower was too much for him. I wasn't surprised.

Kameron joined Andrew and Klaryssia in their little huddle around me, and promptly declared that the rake was his. As you might expect, chaos ensued, I mowed on. I can't recall how long it took to finish the back yard - stopping every four or five seconds to clear the grass, frantically watching all around to ensure that the kids kept all their body parts intact, trying to get them the heck away from the mower. . . it was a mommie nightmare.

By the time I got to the front yard, they were bored - thank You, Jesus - and I got that part done pretty quickly. Of course, by then I was exhausted and thinking a tall glass of wine (cold and white) sounded awesome. Unfortunately, it was only around 11:00 am, and I decided I should wait a few more hours. Thankfully, the grass got cut, no one got seriously hurt (Kobi's white kicks got a little grass-stained, but what the heck), and one more Chore got crossed off my list for now.

That night, at dinner, I heard from them all what a good job I did, and what great helpers they were.

Indeed. Couldn't have done it without them.