Hello All!
We hope each of you had a wonderful and happy Thanksgiving weekend. December is finally upon us! It has been three weeks since our last email. Per the usual, much to catch up on. Here are the highlights!
*Thanksgiving: We celebrated Thanksgiving at home, in our newly renovated, finally almost done home! It was our year to be with the Leakes, but since Richard had to work Wednesday and Friday, we decided to stay here and we convinced Bob and Becky to join us! They arrived late Wednesday afternoon. It was so great to have them here. Everyone pitched in for our amazing feast. We ate about 4:00 pm, and we spent our time before the meal relaxing, watching football, playing games, building legos, and of course, making food! Bob, Becky, Bridget, Rachel, Gretchen and I all pitched in to make the apple pie, and dare I say, it was the best pie we have ever made! Not even a bit of juice leaked out of the crust (that is definitely a first for me). Amazing. It was so nice to have all of us in the kitchen working on something and to have the room to do it! It honestly made me so happy to have the kitchen full of people and conversation and cooperation. Richard smoked a tri-tip and cooked the turkey breast in the crockpot. Marshall, single-handedly made the raspberry pretzel jello and the stuffing. Bridget did the mashed potatoes with Becky doing the peeling, but B literally did everything else. Rachel shirked her food responsibilities with me on Wednesday evening to hang with friends (haha!) but she did help me roll out all the rolls on Thursday morning and she did the topping for the sweet potatoes. Sweet Grizz helped set the table, helped with the apple pie, and argued with Rachel about helping with the rolls. :) It was a delicious feast. After relaxing and playing more games, we dove into the pies. Three store-bought, and then that delicious apple pie. A success all around. We always have so much to be thankful for, but especially this year, our gratitude is ever-present. From an almost complete home that allows us to gather, to my healing ankle, and ALL the help we have received from SO many over the last 3 1/2 months. I get emotional every time I think about the help that has so freely been shared with us. Most people who have helped us say they hardly did anything, but one thing that has been impressed upon me time and time again during this long recovery is, when you are able-bodied, many things seem small and maybe the help seems inconsequential to you, but to someone, or to a family that is dealing with a lot, even the smallest amount of help can lighten a huge load. It has been tender to be on the receiving end of so much help.
*Electrical fire: While I am on the topic of gratitude, I might as well record the scare that was our Monday morning. A little after 8:20 on Monday morning, Grizz and I were the only ones home. We were in the kitchen and we both heard a noise upstairs. It wasn't loud, but loud enough for both of us to hear. It almost sounded like something got knocked over, was sliding down the wall, and then fell on the ground. Gretchen asked what the noise was, I told her what I thought, but she was not buying my answer. She told me she didn't think there was anything upstairs that could fall, but she had just come from the upstairs, so I told her maybe she accidentally brushed against something that was slow to fall. Great explanation, right?! I'm the best mom. Anyway, I finished her hair and got back to my breakfast and unloading the dishwasher while she went to the mudroom to grab her things. When she came back to the kitchen she asked me what that smell was. At first, I didn't smell anything, but then I caught a whiff of it and instantly knew that something was burning. I hobbled over to the entryway and looked up the stairs and saw SMOKE at the top of the stairs. I ran up the stairs (with my boot on, so this was not fast by any means). There was no smoke in the girls bathroom, but I turned into our room and it was filling with smoke. No flames, but definitely smoky. I immediately called Richard while feeling the TV and all of his computer stuff. Nothing was hot. Our bathroom was smoky, but not as smoky as the bedroom. Richard told me to send Gretchen outside to see if she could see fire on our roof and I went to the basement to flip the circuit breakers. After getting back up to our bedroom and still not seeing flames anywhere, but knowing the smoke was getting worse, we decided I should call 911. Sweet Gretchen was making her lunch while I was on the phone with 911. After talking to them and telling me help was on the way, they told me to get everyone out of the house. I put Ziggy on his leash and Grizz and I scooped up her things and left. I was calm through all of this, but at that moment, when we walked out of the house, I thought "It could all end here. This beautiful space we just created could go up in flames at any moment!" Ah!!! We finished getting Gretchen's coat and shoes on just as the first police officer pulled up. He immediately ran in the house and I gave Gretchen a hug and a kiss and sent her to the Howell's to catch a ride to school. Seconds later, two fire trucks, two ambulances, a second police car, and a fire department SUV came flying up our circle. This is also when all the neighbors appeared. :) These first responders were amazing. It is sobering to be told to evacuate your home and moments later, complete strangers are walking into an unknown and possibly dangerous situation in your home, in order to help you. After several minutes, a firefighter walked out with our bluetooth speaker! Richard had plugged it in that morning and clearly something happened to it and that is what was causing all that smoke. Bananas. The firefighters were so great. Even after finding the speaker, they checked our circuit breaker boxes and all our furnaces and just about everything else. They opened windows and brought in huge fans to clear out the smoke. Everyone took great care of me and Ziggy. The police wrapped Ziggy in a blanket because he was a shaking mess, and they even let us keep it. And my wonderful neighbors wrapped me in a blanket because I was outside in a nightgown and a hoodie! And my boot. A great look. I was able to get back inside around 9:45 or so, I think. I just laid on the couch for a while, in a bit of a fog, before coming to my senses enough to call my Mom. I smelled terrible and was in desperate need of a shower and I knew we were going to have workers showing up at any time. My Mom was so great and dropped everything and came straight over. Later that afternoon, while I was gone, but both my parents were here, the electrician who had done all of our work came to the house. The fire department recommended he come just to double check his work. Honestly, I am so glad I was gone when he arrived and that my parents were able to handle all of this. Also because they could ask questions and get answers straight from him, instead of me, in my still dazed-state! Turns out, it was just the speaker. Even the power strip it was plugged into was totally fine. No sign of fire or scorch marks at the outlet or the circuit breaker boxes. Nate, the electrician, validated how scary the whole ordeal was, but said that the speaker actually failed exactly how it was supposed to. It contained all the flames and sparks and didn't catch anything else on fire, just produced a ton of smoke! We are SO thankful that the only damage was to the speaker. Our room has aired itself out. Nothing else is damaged. And we are safe. That is really all that matters.
*Three month check-up: If Monday wasn't already exciting enough, I had my three-month follow-up with my surgeon. I drove up to the appointment in my boot and while in my car, I changed out of my boot and put a shoe on! Haha! He really wanted me to walk into this appointment totally "normal", but my physical therapist I would say is on the more conservative side, so I faked it for a bit. I have walked and done enough at PT with two shoes on that I felt fairly confident doing this. :) Also, my appointment ended up being with just the NP, who was much more understanding of my progress. :) But, my x-rays look great and the screws are all in there tight, which was my biggest worry because of horror stories I have heard! So, I just keep going with PT and spend more and more time out of the boot and brace and go back in 3 more months. What an ordeal. On Wednesday morning I put the brace on instead of the boot and have spent the majority of my time in the brace since. It is very stabilizing, but gives me definitely more range of motion than the boot and that has been helpful. I can tell things are loosening up, in a good way!
*School musical: Rachel auditioned for the elementary school musical, Frozen Jr. a couple of weeks ago. In that same week I was roped into being a choreographer, Gretchen joined the cast (this is not open to 2nd graders but because I am helping and one cast is significantly smaller than the other, Gretchen gets to join) and Rachel and five other girls ended up being double cast (again, to help with the smaller cast). My oh my. Pray for us from now until the middle of March! Haha! I don't think it will get terribly intense until February/March, but then it will be bananas. Gretchen is in Olaf's chorus-could this be any more fitting for her?! She has loved Olaf for years. Rachel was really hoping to be Queen Iduna (Elsa and Anna's mom) but instead she is in Elsa's Snow Chorus. Essentially these are Elsa's back-up dancers/singers and apparently they get a good chunk of stage time. This is what I am choreographing! All of these girls are dancers, with limited availability because of dance, and they are the only people double-cast. Rachel initially was hugely disappointed, but once I explained the director's vision for them and how she went about figuring all of this out, she felt better about it. And she has tasked me with making her shine. Zero pressure. Especially since I haven't choreographed anything since 2015. Gulp. It will be fun sharing this with my girls, and I haven't sat down to think too much about it, so the overwhelm has not totally consumed me!
*Speaking of theatre...Richard and I went to go see Beauty and the Beast at Hale Theatre and it was amazing. Anything at Hale is always amazing, but by the sounds of it, they really pushed the limits of their stage with Beauty and the Beast and it showed! It was all just stellar, and a great evening out with Richard. We loved it so much, we bought tickets to take our older girls during Christmas break. Also, I must include Wicked in this paragraph. Gretchen has been waiting on pins and needles to see Wicked and has watched the trailer countless times. Rachel went to a birthday party last weekend for Sara and they all went to see Wicked. Then on Wednesday, with the kids out of school, I took all three girls and we had the BEST time. Oh my. That movie is amazing. We have been listening to the soundtrack on repeat and now Instagram's algorithm is showing me all things Wicked and I am lapping it all up! It was so, so well done. We were all captivated for the entire show, even Gretchen. I have to see it one more time in the theater and we already can't wait for the second movie next November.
*Richard in Idaho: Richard had to work in Idaho a couple of weeks ago for a Thursday and Friday. He was just helping someone out up there, so this is not a normal thing. Anyway, he drove up after work that Wednesday and that Friday, the girls and I met him up at Maddox for dinner! Amazing! Marshall had a better offer, or so he thought, and went to a pie night with friends. We certainly missed him, but we still had a great evening. We listened to Christmas music the whole way and talked and laughed and were so happy to be reunited with Richard. Dinner, as always at Maddox, was delicious and we left with a slice of banana cream pie to go.
*BYU games: Richard and Marshall have made it to the last two BYU home games of the season, in frigid temperatures and all! One loss, one win, but of course, they had a great time, as always.
*Saturday we took Marshall and Bridget to do baptisms at the temple. Next time we go, we will have Rachel with us! Marshall passed Richard up in height in September and it was fun to watch Richard baptize Marshall because Marshall is the taller one now!
*Food bags: Just yesterday we wrapped up our 7th annual neighborhood service project. This is the 4th year we have provided food bags for USANA Kids Eat, but this is the first year our elementary school has been in need of bags. These bags go home with kids over Christmas break who would not have enough to eat otherwise. Saturday afternoon we went shopping for our portion of the bags. Our kids were great and it was a fun little outing that we topped off with a stop at Handel's ice cream. Delicious. This is the second year we have roped the Atkinsons and Sonntags into helping us with the service project. We all ended up shopping Saturday afternoon and within an hour, our living room was brimming with grocery bags full of food. Yesterday at 1:00 everyone came over, plus a few more people from the neighborhood. We had the kids sort all the food, we figured out the best way to pack the bags, and then let the kids circle around the island gathering food. Within minutes we had 27 bags of food ready to be delivered to two different elementary schools. It was a really fun afternoon. People stayed and visited and it was just so great.
Okay, I think that just about wraps up our last three weeks. Oh my goodness, how could I forget...looking through pictures...Rachel's school class is making Egyptian death masks at school this coming week and in preparation we had to make the plaster mask AT HOME! I about died when I got the email about this. We had to watch videos and slather her face in vaseline so the mask didn't take off skin or eyebrows, which Rachel was very paranoid about! It took the better part of a Wednesday evening a couple of weeks ago. Good grief. I am happy to report that Rachel retained her eyebrows!
That's really it now. Happy December! Bring on all the Christmas delights!
Love each of you,
Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel and Gretchen :)
No comments:
Post a Comment