The Leake's Week-August 8, 2024

 Hello, hello!

I started writing this days and days ago, but never finished it before we left on our trip on July 27th!  Ah!  I finished it today, and am sending it even though it is very old news.  The whole second half of July-which honestly seems like a lifetime ago!  Ha!  With any luck I will get our vacation written up this weekend, so you just might see two emails from me this week.  Just look at the pictures.  :)

Here's a two week re-cap of our highlights!

*Tuesday the 16th was a fun and full day!  I had a meeting that morning with the elementary school principal because I am finally fulfilling an eight year dream and heading up a fun run fundraiser for the elementary school.  I am equal parts excited and stressed!  Ha!  Rachel played at a friend's house most of the afternoon and Gretchen roamed the neighborhood with friends and had a grand time.  I took Marshall and Bridget to the Layton Temple to do baptisms that afternoon too.  Marshall actually drove us to and from and did a fantastic job, including on Highway 89, I-15, and navigated the Chick-Fil-A parking lot, which is no easy task!  The temple was so great.  It was efficient and peaceful and special to see Marshall do the baptisms for Bridget.  A great afternoon.  That evening, we divided and conquered.  Richard took Marshall and Bridget to a cross country BBQ and they had a great time.  Rachel was at dance all evening, and while I currently have no memory of what Gretchen did, I am certain she was with friends.  I went to a birthday party for Richard's Aunt Tish, and while I wasn't there very long, it was great to wish her a happy 75th and catch up with some people and meet some family I had never met before!  

*Wednesday the 17th I took Marshall to the stake center at 6:30 am and he was off on trek!  This is the first time our stake has done trek in six years, so even though I found the preparation for this adventure completely overwhelming, and contemplated not sending him many times, the day came, we had him ready, and off he went.  We picked him up at 2:30 pm on Saturday afternoon and he was completely covered in dust, but looked great!  His ma and pa were the Zollingers and he really liked them.  He had three other brothers in his family and three sisters.  They pulled five miles the first day, about six the second day, eight the third day and then I think five on the last day.  They played fun pioneer games each day, and also lots of cards.  :)  They ate great food-hello cinnamon rolls for breakfast!  Unlike any other trek I have been on!  Ha!  They slept in tents and only got rained on one night.  They worked hard and played hard and by all accounts it was a success.  Marshall says he would rate it as a 7 on a scale of 1 to 10-so not too shabby.  Our neighbors were there and said any time they saw Marshall he had a smile on his face and seemed to be having a great time.  

*That night, on the 17th, Richard played board and card games with a bunch of guys in our neighborhood and had a great time!  He came home super late, despite being exhausted from starting work at 5:00 am that morning!  Glad he had a fun night out.  Gretchen has been begging me for days to take her to the creek at Smoot Park to play in the water and I finally fulfilled her dreams.  I took Gretchen and the three youngest Howell girls.  The Howells have been playing in this creek regularly all summer long, so they hopped right in, but Gretchen, despite her extreme desire to go, was, no surprise, very cautious!  It took her a few minutes to get in and get going.  The girls got in the creek, walked upstream a bit, and then walked down quite a ways to an area that opens up more and has calmer and deeper water.  Gretchen has never liked uneven terrain, so anytime she was hesitant, Sabrina Howell, who is just a handful of months older than her, would pick her up and carry her over the part that made her nervous.  It made me chuckle and roll my eyes all at the same time.  Have we babied Gretchen too much...maybe so!  It really was a fun evening though.  The girls played, and I sat in my chair and listened to marco polos and read a book!  A great evening!

*On the 18th, Ziggy woke up and immediately threw up.  I didn't think much of it, but as the day went on and he kept throwing up and did not seem himself, I took him to the vet.  Hundreds of dollars later, an x-ray, a barrium study, followed by a second x-ray, and bloodwork, the poor thing was diagnosed with pancreatitis!  Poor little creature!  They sent us home with special food, two medications, and gave him a shot to settle his stomach.  Very thankfully, he has seemed to make a complete recovery.  He was not a fan of his food and medicine, but after a couple of days, Richard figured out that if he sat by Ziggy on the ground, Ziggy would eat!  This tactic only worked for me a couple of times, but bless Richard, he fed that dog and gave him his medicine morning and night.  We had to drop Ziggy off at doggy daycare when he still had two days of medicine and special food left.  He was doing so much better, but I was still so worried to leave him.  I cried before I left the house with him!  What has this dog done to me?!?!  We all love him dearly.  I am thrilled to report that he survived doggy daycare and has been eating and drinking great since we brought him home!  

*On the morning of July 20th Bridget ran to the V with the cross country team-I was so proud of her!  This was really hard for her last year, so I was surprised when she wanted to do it again.  Also, Marshall was still on trek, so she was the only one waking up at 6:00 am on a Saturday!  She did want Richard and I both to go walk up the trail and meet her up there to cheer her in, but since we were still worried about Ziggy, I stayed home and Richard went since I went last year.  Bridget did SO good!  She was the second runner from the ramp team (the 7th and 8th graders) to make it up there and she even beat all the boys!  She reports it was much easier than last year and I am so proud of her and so glad Richard could be up there to cheer her in!

*On July 20th I took the girls up to Deer Valley for an evening of Disney with the Utah Symphony.  I have never been up there to a concert before and it was so fun!  We left early and had dinner at a great pizza place in Park City.  We had great seats for the show and it was SO nice to be out of the heat!  By intermission we were all in hoodies and a couple of the girls had blankets on their legs.  Heavenly.  The symphony brought in three fantastic singers and they did a great job.  They sang songs from Encanto, Frozen, Little Mermaid, Jungle Book, Cinderella, and many more I am now forgetting.  It was a fun night out with my girls.

*Rachel and Gretchen did their second and final week of swim lessons for the summer the end of July.  They both rocked it.  Rachel has hugely improved her dives off the diving board and now belly flops are a thing of her past!  She is a strong swimmer, and I am so grateful for that.  Gretchen has made HUGE improvements from last summer.  Her front crawl was hilarious to watch last summer and now she is rocking it, and she loves doing it!  That is my kids least favorite stroke, but any time she was in the pool on our trip she was just doing lap after lap of front crawl!  Now her backstroke is hilarious.  She has not grasped the concept of how to do your arms in the backstroke.  I took a video and sent it to my parents.  I was dying.  She is so stinking cute and I could watch her all day.  Despite not having the stroke down, she can finally float on her back.  Big accomplishment for one so tiny!  And speaking of those two, they both finished out their summer sessions of dance and tumbling.  They should each have a good dance year ahead of them!  

*Exciting home update:  we have kitchen counters!  They are gorgeous.  I wish this meant we were close to being done, but alas, it is still far off.  

Love,

Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel, and Gretchen :)

Oh my goodness, how could I forget?!  Two days before we left, our neighbors who we share the hill with had a sprinkler pipe at the top of the hill break (curse sprinklers!).  During the night, it destroyed the hill!  So crazy!  Turns out, the hill was filled with sand so the sand eventually got so wet it just all slid to the bottom of the hill and a bunch of the sand spilled out through our rock wall.  So bananas!  Hollow at the top, packed with sand at the bottom.  

The Leake's Week-July 14, 2024

 Hello!  

The last three weeks have flown by.  Sigh.  Here's the catch up...

*House progress!  While we are currently at another stand-still (very maddening at this point!) we have had great house progress the previous two weeks.  The wood flooring is in and 100% done and gorgeous.  We chose an engineered hardwood in white oak and we love it.  The wood planks are wide and it is a beautiful, warm, looking floor.  There is quite a bit of variation in the wood, but not too much variation and we love it.  It is all currently covered up by flooring protection, but we got to bask in its beauty for a few days before it was covered.  The flooring guys had to come back a couple of times to finish the edge detailing around stairs and transition points, but it is finally all done and we are so happy with it.  This flooring covers the whole main floor, with the exception of the half bath and laundry/mudroom.  And speaking of those two rooms, tile is going in there.  The week tile was supposed to be installed, our flooring company had to fire one of their two tile installers, which has created this huge backlog for them, and a huge delay for us.  Our most recent update is tile will finally go in on July 25th, but it will take multiple days.  Deep breaths.  But, in other positive news, all the exterior work is done.  Yay!  That has been days and days in the making, but it is finished and looks great.  We just had to have a bunch of patchwork done where windows were changed/shifted and a door was removed.  We had to have brick patchwork done, new soffits on some of the back of the house, and hardy board installed and painted in three different locations.  Those guys who did the brick were incredible and were able to use brick that was pulled off the house to patch everything, and looking at it now, you would never know!  The new soffits look fantastic.  But the real winner of the show is the hardy board.  We did board and batten on our biggest section in the back and then lap siding on the two bay windows.  It is painted hale navy by Benjamin Moore with white dove accents for the trim.  Hello!  Gorgeous.  Richard and I love it.  It is going to take loads of self control to not have the rest of our old wood siding ripped off the house and replaced with this.  Haha!  So, for now we will live with portions of a gorgeous exterior, while we have paint literally peeling off the older stuff above it!  One day!  And lastly, cabinet boxes were installed on July 2nd.  AHHHH!!!  This was such a happy day.  It has really helped us see the potential of our main floor, but has also made us crazy, because we seem so close, but also so far away from having this finished.  The kitchen island is also painted hale navy and we love it.  All the other kitchen cabinets are creamy white by Benjamin Moore and even though we don't have any cabinet doors yet, I am very happy with this color choice!  Just ever so subtle in its color, just a little creamy, while still looking white, without being too bright!  So, for now, we will cling to this progress and try not to think that this whole project was supposed to be done on July 29th.  

*4th of July!  Richard didn't have to work on the 4th, which is a rarity!  We were so happy to have him with us for the day.  We kicked off our celebrations with the Centerville Parade.  My Mom and I had set chairs up at city hall the day before and had great seats.  That made our morning easy.  Bridget did have to milk the goats at the farm that morning, so I left at 8:30 with the three other kids and Richard stayed at home to wait for her.  But, we all managed to get parked and settled in our seats before the parade made it to us.  As a side note, Rachel and I have not seen a parade since July 4, 2019.  With Covid in 2020 and 2021 Centerville didn't do a parade, and then the Centerville fire in 2022 cancelled the parade, and then Rachel and I were in San Diego for dance last year on the 4th.  Rachel has been looking forward to July 4th for months now.  She was SO excited last week.  When I was putting her to bed on the 3rd, she told me this was going to be the best July 4th of her life.  I hope it lived up to her expectations!  She did seem pretty happy though!  Anyway, back to the parade.  Our chairs were set a little further back from the road, but a perfect little spot opened up for the 3 girls right on the curb.  My Mom was so nice to sit up there with them and help them catch candy, which I will say, was lacking!  There was probably some disappointment there for Rachel!  The parade was fun, though small!  My parents guessed there were only about 50 entries, and during the two years they chaired Centerville's 4th, there were about 100!  But, none of us complained about a shorter parade.  One funny thing though is Viewmont was the entire first 1/3 of the parade it seemed!  Haha!  They had the color guard and marching band, and then there was the football team, baseball team, Vykelles, cheerleaders, dance company, class officers, and I might even be forgetting some!  It was nuts!  After we got home from the parade, we enjoyed a relaxing rest of the morning.  The kids played, watched TV (something we have done way too much of during this remodel!) and napped.  About 2:00 we left for Danny and Stacie's.  They had set up three little pools in their yard and had loads of water guns.  The kids had an all out water fight for seriously a good two hours.  Marshall didn't bring a swimsuit because he had zero plans to get wet, but within minutes he was soaked.  Haha!  Thankfully, they had a swimsuit that fit Marshall, so he was saved.  So we had a wonderful afternoon of the kids playing and the adults visiting, with the occasional referee action required.  :)  One thing I love about getting together with Danny's boys is they give Marshall a run for his money!  Ha!  They play physical and don't let Marshall get away with a thing-something that boy needs with only sisters!  Anyway, it was just a great time.  We had a BBQ, played a couple of games, ate some root beer floats, and watched a bit of soccer as everyone started to peter out.  A little after 8:00, we headed home, but left Rachel and Gretchen there for a scheduled sleepover.  My younger girls have been begging for a sleepover with Danny's boys for two years and we finally made it happen.  Haha!  By all accounts, they had a fun time!  Danny and Stacie did sparklers with them, watched Encanto, and then put everyone to bed.  Danny made pancakes in the morning and everyone got a little more playtime before I picked them up at 10:00.  Thank you to Danny and Stacie for making a big summer dream come true!  Back to the night of the 4th, once Richard and I got home with the older kids, we watched "The Truman Show" with them!  Richard has claimed this as his favorite movie since before I even met him, so it was fun to finally watch it with our older kids.  Centerville really stretched out their 4th of July celebrations, which I actually loved.  Saturday morning, Bridget and I helped with face painting at the park from 9:00-11:00.  It was SO fun.  Bridget did an absolutely fantastic job and I am so glad we were able to do that together.  Centerville also did fireworks that night which we all went to.  There were some technical difficulties, so it was not as grand and as smooth as it has been in the past, but still a fun evening with a good show!

Okay, here's a quick catch-up person by person...

*Gretchen:  It was so fun to watch Gretchen at swim lessons last week.  Her comfort level in the water, specifically putting her face all the way in the water, has hugely improved.  And speaking of improvement, she has finally overcome her fear of the little blue and yellow water slides at Cherry Hill.  Yay!  Progress.  Her older sisters are making it their mission this summer to get her on the dragon slides!  Gretchen remains our little social butterfly.  She has been begging for weeks to host another movie night so we were able to do that a couple of Saturdays ago.  Not all of her friends could come, but she had a few over and they watched "Annie" from 2014.  Gretchen was on Cloud 9.  Gretchen loves any chance she gets to play with friends from school, or friends from the neighborhood.  She has worked up the courage to knock on just about any door to find her friends, and she is having loads of fun.  She has had a blast the last three nights, all with the Howell family.  On Thursday they took her with them to the Whitaker Museum here in Centerville as they had a Revolutionary War night and Gretchen loved it.  The next night they took her swimming at the rec center, and last night she did pizza and a movie night with them.  The Howell's are on the verge of a major home renovation too, so each day they are packing more of their things to store, so neither of our homes is super conducive for little girls to play in.  But, these girls are imaginative and creative and trashing Gretchen's room every day they play together, but if they take Gretchen on fun outings during the evening, I will not complain!  I will say though, she has been a bit of a beast to put to bed since we got home from Vernal three weeks ago.  It seems she either goes to bed well, but then ends up in our bed some time during the night, or she is so hard to put to bed and Richard or I end up sleeping in her room for part of the night!  Ah!  Just a few nights ago, we were in a bedtime stand-off with her and she said, "I am going to run away in the morning and you will regret this decision!"  Oh my.  To say we are a tad worried for her teenage years when all her siblings are gone would be an understatement!  This girl knows what she wants and doesn't take no for an answer very well!  Our fault, I am sure.  

*Rachel:  The biggest news from Rachel's last three weeks is she got her ears pierced a week ago!  Hooray!  She has been waiting almost one year to do this and we finally made it happen!  We were going to get them pierced the week she broke her leg last year, but then that leg break completely de-railed us.  And then with dance, she has to wear earrings, so we couldn't have her little studs in, so it has been a long wait for her!  So we finally got it done and she did so great!  She was nervous, but never cried and just held onto my hand and before she knew it, it was done!  She has done a great job taking care of them this last week and hasn't been bothered by them while she is sleeping.  Little Dokie.  She has the best ears, and now she has some sparkly earrings in them.  Rachel also rocked swim lessons last week.  I think this will be the last summer I put her in lessons.  She is very confident in the deep end and with the diving board.  She can do all the strokes and looks great doing them.  Super proud of her.  I just have to toot my own horn here, and my kids too.  Richard is not a swimmer, hates water and never really learned how to swim enough to feel confident in the water.  He thought I was crazy for putting Marshall and Bridget in swim lessons in Wisconsin when they were so little.  And when my kids were little they did not really like water!  But, I insisted with Richard that swimming is a life skill they have to have-for reasons of safety and fun!  I have gotten these kids to the ocean, lakes, swimming pools, water parks and years and years of swim lessons and when I watched my youngest two girls in the water the last week or two, I have had such a sense of accomplishment!  And I am so proud of each of them!  In a family where one parent avoids water, I have raised four great swimmers who love the water and now how to be safe around it.  Still love Richard dearly though.  :)  Okay, anyway, back to Rachel.  Rachel took a bit of a social break from friends in the middle of this three week chunk.  She kind of surprised us all at the beginning of the summer with how social she was, but at heart, she is a homebody, so she took several days at home to rest and chill and reset.  She has been back at it again this week though and has been having loads of fun with Eily.  Dance and tumbling also started back up for her this week after a two week break.  Choreography starts in August and she talks to me about it almost daily, she is super excited.  She has adjusted to not having Sara on her team and feels like her team is in a good spot, which I am grateful for.  

*Bridget:  During my three week hiatus, Bridget had Girls Camp and had a blast.  They left on a Tuesday morning and came home on Friday afternoon.  They went to Camp Atoka, up by Pineview and as luck would have it, the camp director has a cabin within walking distance to Camp Atoka!  Haha!  I am pretty sure they had all their meals at the cabin and even had a movie night there the first night.  They spent an entire day at Pineview that Bridget loved.  They also floated down the river and that was Bridget's favorite activity.  She reports she slept better than last year, so that's good.  :)  She came home happy and we were so glad to have her back.  Bridget has been working at the farm a lot, and still loves it.  She also spends every moment she can with friends.  On Friday night she had a sleepover with Cambria and they slept on Cambria's trampoline and lasted outside all night long.  She has had quite a few Cherry Hill outings with friends and trips to Station Park, always coming home with more Bath and Body Works products. :)  Thanks to Bridget, the basement bathroom smells lovely-Marshall has no idea how lucky he is!  Bridget also has two weeks of band camp behind her and has really enjoyed those.  She also started cross country this last week!  They just let the 7th and 8th graders practice with them for a few weeks in the summer, only three days a week.  Bridget missed the first two weeks because of Girls Camp and farm commitments, so Monday was her first day, and the 7th and 8th graders did a two mile time trial.  Bridget has not run since track ended and I honestly don't even know if those junior high coaches ever had her run more than two miles.  But, I was so proud of Bridget!  She has made it to practice every day since, even on days her friends decided they were too tired or too sore to go.  Go Tinies!  

*Marshall:  Speaking of cross country, Marshall is in it!  Practice officially kicked off June 24th and he has not missed a day.  This was not the case last summer.  It is fun to see your kids grow and progress, but especially when their growth can be observed in such specific ways.  Also, let me say, I cannot wait until Marshall can drive himself to and from practices!!!  Next summer, he and Bridget can just hop in the car at 6:15 am and go!  Speaking of driving, Marshall is furiously working on his online driver's ed course.  Because of his trip to Europe, he started the class two weeks late.  He has been good at plugging along and doing some every day, but I was really hoping he could get it done before he leaves on Trek this Wednesday morning, and I am not quite sure he is going to pull it off.  He's worked hard this last week though, and every bit of progress counts.  As soon as he completes this online stuff, he can start driving with the instructor, and the more he can get that done before school starts, the better off he is going to be with his busy schedule!  Anyway, on to more fun things.  Marshall has been such a social creature since coming home from Europe.  We are loving it!  And we cannot wait to have our house finished so that his friends can actually be here!  Oh, also, at the beginning of this last week, Marshall got his AP scores back for the two tests he took in May.  He got 4's on both of them-AP Human Geography and AP Environmental Science.  We are super proud of him.  It wasn't until after we signed him up for these classes that I started hearing that the junior high had a terrible pass rate for these tests!  They did get a new teacher for geography, and I am certain that that helped.  But, I am super proud of him.  He put in hundreds of hours of work throughout the year and especially in the final weeks leading up to the test.  Also, BYU only accepts a 4 or 5 for environmental science, so he not only passed the test but will credit at BYU if he ends up there.  Marshall has perfected the art of napping this summer, and I am loving it.  Nearly every afternoon I find him asleep somewhere, and it always makes me so happy.  We did force Marshall to go get his ferritin level tested-he was not happy with this!  Haha!  The cross country coaches have been pushing this, but not requiring it.  Despite being very grumpy with me, he did great with the blood draw and I rewarded him with In-N-Out afterward.  :)  No surprise to Richard and I, his iron came back on the low side of normal, so now we're trying to boost his iron up which directly correlates to running faster.  :)  

*Richard and me:  All I will say is, we are tired!!!  Haha!  These late summer nights and early mornings are not our friend, but we are surviving.  Richard and I finally carved out time for a date last night, something beyond running to grab dinner from somewhere close.  It was so nice!  I took Richard to a taco place up in Ogden that Stacie introduced me to.  It was nice to just be in the car and have so much time to talk.  Richard loved the tacos and the horchata and it was a great dinner!  After that, we made a very quick stop at RC Willey to look at couches and then went mini golfing at Boondocks.  We haven't done that, just the two of us, in ages.  It was so fun!  A great evening.  Yesterday afternoon we also got to go to a wedding reception for one of Richard's cousins on the Leake side.  She and her husband, who is from Germany, got married in Germany a couple of weeks ago and did a lovely and laid back reception at Mueller Park yesterday.  We have not seen many people in the Leake family in years and years, so it was fun to get reacquainted.  If you ask our kids, they would say they barely survived.  :)  But, we are glad they could meet some more extended family.  

Okay, I think that is it!  I now consider each email a miracle.  :)  Thanks for reading!

Love,

Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel, and Gretchen :)

P.S.  Ziggy had to be shaved at the end of June.  These drastic haircuts always send him into dismay for a few days.  This episode was exceptionally long.  He had to wear one of his sweatshirts, even with temperatures in the 90s and it took him nearly two weeks to get back to himself!  Silly thing.  

The Leake's Week-June 25, 2024

 Hello!

The summer is flying by!  Marshall is home from Europe, Bridget is off at Girls' Camp, and between those two things, we spent a good chunk of time in Vernal last week!  Suitcases abound!  And I am two weeks behind in writing.  There has been SO much going on.  Let's see if I can capture the highlights of the last two weeks...

*Gretchen wrapped up a two week tennis class with friends in which she held her tennis racket in her left hand for every single class and refused to try hitting a tennis ball with her racket in her right hand.  She is right handed!!!  No wonder that stubborn girl was so frustrated!  Who knows if she will ever attempt tennis again!

*I met my dear friend, Lara Vanhille, for lunch in Bountiful a couple of weeks ago.  Even though Lara grew up here and graduated from Viewmont a year before me, I didn't meet her until she and her husband, (who I did go to high school with) moved to Milwaukee.  We became fast friends.  They moved to Salem, Utah five years ago so our meet-ups have been few and far between.  But, they just moved up to Farmington and we are elated to have them so close!  It was easy peasy to coordinate our schedules and meet up in Bountiful for lunch.  We loved catching up with each other and it was a great way to spend the lunch hour.   

*I had a movie afternoon with my girls a couple of weeks ago and introduced them to "Emma", the one with Gwyneth Paltrow.  I have been wanting to watch this since we got home from London!  I haven't watched it in decades and I was in heaven.  My girls did a good job following along, and kind of liked it.  :)  

*Richard went to dinner with some men in our neighborhood at a German restaurant, Weller's.  He had a fun evening and enjoyed a social evening out.  Proud of him and happy for him!  

*On Wednesday, June 12th, our wonderful drywall crew told me that we were not going to want to be home at all on Thursday and Friday.  I appreciated the heads up!  I called my parents, and we decided to stay at their house Thursday-Saturday.  The crew showed up about 8:00 am on Thursday and the girls, the dog, and I were out of there by 9:30!  Things were already COVERED in dust.  It was nuts.  We picked up Gretchen from her last tennis class, and then dropped her off at the school with her besties, Afton and Evelyn.  Gretchen was thrilled to get more playtime with her friends at the school while Mrs. Hope kept organizing her new classroom.  Gretchen had the best day with them and got to go to their house to play for the rest of the afternoon until I picked her up at 5:00!  After we dropped Gretchen off, we took Ziggy and our things to my parents' house.  Ziggy was not happy to be left behind, but my Dad, especially, took great care of our little creature.  After all of that, Bridget, Rachel and I went to Cherry Hill!  We had so much fun.  It was a blast to just be there with those two.  We got there right after it opened, and after a quick dip in the lazy river, we went and did the dragon slides.  I have not been on these since I was 23, and now I am 40!  I will admit, I was nervous, even though these slides are so tame!  But, my girls talked me into it, and I loved it and we went over and over without ever having a line.  It was so much fun.  Rachel went with me sometimes and it was a riot.  We also spent loads of time in the lazy river.  It was so fun and relaxing and I loved that focused time with my oldest girls.  So that was a great way to spend out of our house and drywall dust!  And Ziggy was so relieved to see us walk in my parents' door around 3:00 pm.  My parents were so great to let us come and crash at their house.  It was also good timing, because Marshall was still gone, so we just needed space for the five of us and we took over their basement!  We had dinners with them Thursday and Friday and just enjoyed time with them and played games and relaxed.  Very thankful to them!

*Drywall clean up was just a blast!  Of course, Richard worked that weekend, so clean up fell largely to me.  We did go over to the house that Friday night to see what needed to be done.  I was relieved to see that the rooms where we had kept the doors shut faired well.  Unfortunately, the girls bathroom door had been left open, so it was dusty, but I did recruit Rachel and Gretchen to help me clean that bathroom, and between the three of us, it went quickly.  I went over early Saturday morning before it was too hot, and cleaned our bedroom.  We had covered everything in plastic, but because drywall had to be done in our bathroom, including the new door way, it was dusty!  I got it totally cleaned up that morning though and it felt good.  I spent the rest of the morning using the shop vac to vacuum a lot of our main floor.  Rachel helped me wipe down all the banisters.  Bridget cleaned up her room (her ceiling had to be patched).  We kept all the doors and windows open and that helped a lot too, but it was very hot!  By late afternoon, things were feeling better inside and we gathered up our things from my parents' house and came back home!  

*The girls and I did sneak away that Saturday afternoon to go see Inside Out 2.  Gretchen has been wanting to see this for months, so it was fun to take her.  I went to the movie theater in my dusty drywall clothes, and enjoyed sitting down, putting my feet up, and relaxing a bit!  Gretchen loved the movie and the other two girls thought it was okay.  :)  

*Marshall came HOME very, very late that Saturday night!  That day he flew from Athens, to Munich, to Chicago O'Hare, and then finally to Salt Lake City.  Their flight was delayed in Athens, so they barely made their connecting flight in Munich, and then his flight was delayed leaving Chicago.  Richard was so worn out from his work weekend, and having to work again on Sunday, he opted to go to bed.  So I was the one to pick up Marshall just after midnight at the airport!  It was SO good to see him!  I warned him I was going to give him a big hug and he let me hold onto him for a good while.  I immediately told him he grew!  We measured him the next day and he is so close to 5'9".  Not exceptionally tall, but considering that is Richard's height, it seems tall around our house!  Anyway, we got Marshall's bag, I told his tour leaders thank you and we were off!  Marshall fell asleep within five minutes of being in the car and slept all the way home.  He told me he stayed up late with kids the night before and only got two hours of sleep before they had to leave for the airport!  Teenagers!  We did go to my parents' house that Sunday evening and listening to Marshall tell them about his trip was the first we had heard him talk about it.  Once we got home that night, he showed us all his pictures and told us lots.  It was so great!  He loved both Italy and Greece and they did get one day in Turkey, in Ephesus.  He said it was 110 degrees that day though, so that was rough.  His favorite out of everything they did was the Colosseum.  Other favorites were visiting Orvietto, a small mountain town they stopped in between Rome and Florence.  He also loved walking around Florence.  In Greece they spent a day at the beach swimming in the Mediterranean!  He said it was cold, but it felt so good.  They ended the trip with a four day cruise, stopping in Mykonos, Santorini, Rhodes, and then ending in Ephesus.  What a trip!  He reports he had great fun, never threw up, never lost his passport, and came home with a lot of souvenirs.  :)  

*Speaking of Marshall, this trip seemed to flip a switch in him and suddenly he wants to be very social.  The Monday after he got home he went running with friends that morning and then hung out with them on the track for three hours.  Then that night he got back together with cross country friends-we hardly saw him that day!  This trend has pretty much continued, and I am happy for him.

*Bridget went to Cherry Hill last Tuesday with her three friends who have passes.  Tuesday was the first day all summer all four of them were available to go.  It was the coldest day of the summer, but those girls had a ball.  They got there at 10:30 am, and Richard picked them up at 4:30.  Bridget was thrilled to report they had gone down Kodiak Canyon 48 times!  Haha!  Because of the cooler temperatures, they pretty much had the place to themselves, so to them, the cold was very worth it!  Such crazies!  Ah, to be young!

*Last Wednesday morning Richard, the kids and the dog, left for Vernal.  They were out there by lunch time.  They played a lot of games, Bridget spent as much time as possible with the horses and riding Fred, they watched movies, Marshall went running, and they just relaxed and hung out.  On Friday morning Richard and Marshall went golfing with Bob and Joe and had a fun time.  Friday afternoon was spent swimming at the rec center and then dinner and games at Joe and Aubri's.  

*I got the luxury of staying home Wednesday and Thursday!  It was the best.  I had book club on Thursday evening that I really wanted to go to, so that's why I stayed and I appreciated Richard's support to stay behind!  We read "The Girl with the Louding Voice", which I loved, but sadly, I found our book club discussion sub par...which is rare!  So, it was a bit disappointing, but I do not regret staying home and taking those two days to myself!  I went on two long walks, did a major cleaning of Gretchen's room, napped, watched a show, went to dinner with my parents, which was SO fun, and just enjoyed doing whatever I wanted whenever I wanted!  Bliss!  I did get up early Friday morning and was out the door before 9:00 am.  I drove to BYU to go to a Cougar Club sale for Richard.  I was able to snag some sought after jerseys for Richard and Marshall, so they are very happy.  After that, I drove to Vernal and met up with the family at the rec center a little before 2:00 pm.  It was happy to be reunited!  Richard and Marshall left Vernal Saturday afternoon, but the girls and I stayed until Sunday afternoon.  It was so great to be out there and see Bob and Becky and spend time with them.  Bridget loves those horses and rode Fred multiple times a day and even rode Asher, a trickier horse, with Bob's help in the round pen Friday and Saturday.  We played games, the girls played outside, and I soaked in the Leake's very peaceful backyard.  I love it.  Ziggy spent his time trying to avoid Barkley, the Leake's dog, and barking and growling and barking and growling.  :)

*Our house is coming along!  Last week, the only thing that got worked on was the exterior, which still isn't done, but it is creeping along and looking good!  Flooring started yesterday!  Ahhh!!!  Should be all done (except the carpet in the loft) by Friday.  Fingers crossed!  

Love each of you.

Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel, and Gretchen :)

The Leake's Week-June 9 , 2024

 Hello!

Here's what we've been up to this last week with just two kids at home!  

Gretchen and Rachel both caught up on sleep Monday morning.  Gretchen slept until almost 9:00 and Rachel almost 10:00.  Bananas!  We just took care of things around the house, I walked Ziggy, and then our afternoon was filled with tumbling and dance!  Rachel and Sara had a tumbling private lesson, then Gretchen had tumbling and then went straight into two hours of dance class.  Rachel got a fun afternoon of playing with Sara before they both went back to the studio for regular tumbling class.  While all of that was happening, I was getting my permanent crown on and getting the runaround with my Walmart grocery order!  After all of that was done, the four of us had a quick shopping trip to Target and then came home and played Mario Kart for a bit before going to bed.  

Tuesday morning began with tennis class for Gretchen!  A friend from school invited Gretchen and another friend to do a tennis class this summer, and without hesitation, Gretchen said yes.  Tuesday morning was the first class.  Gretchen was so excited to go and came home raving about it.  Our house was a buzz of activity all day on Tuesday.  It was awesome!  All day long we had people here working on drywall, our project manager spent about half the day here running the show, our Bluerock crew was here finishing last minute demo, cleaning up, and covering even more of our house in plastic.  :)  We also had a guy come by who is providing everything for the banisters, baseboards, doors, trim, and wood for finished carpentry things.  I had to make a lot of decisions with him in a span of about 30 minutes...a little stressful!  Ha!  But, SO exciting!  All of that happened before lunch.  :)  After the girls and I had a quick lunch, they changed into their swimming suits and we got ready for a water party outside!  Gretchen has been begging for a water party with friends for weeks now and I told her the week Marshall and Bridget were gone, I could make all her dreams come true.  :)  She waited mostly patiently.  :)  She invited seven friends, and all of them were able to come, plus I let Rachel invite a friend.  It was fun!  We bought a giant inflatable unicorn sprinkler, so we had that going, plus a kitty pool and buckets full of water for water spray things, and we had bubbles.  For the most part, the girls all played pretty well together...there was some unhappiness when they started breaking into teams, but I pulled out the otter pops and that seemed to help.  :)  The girls played and ran and got wet and ate all the otter pops and just had a good time!  It was a fun afternoon.  Everyone left shortly after 3:00 and the girls and I cleaned up.  Rachel left for dance about 3:30 and Gretchen and I just relaxed!  So nice!  After dance, Rachel went straight to a birthday party and had the best time.  I picked her up at 10:00 and she was exhausted, but so happy.  Richard, Gretchen and I had dinner at Hug-Hes and Gretchen was in heaven with their bread.  :)  That night before bed, Gretchen had a major spiral about tennis.  She went off on a rant about how she actually hated tennis, she is not good at it, and never wants to play again.  :)  Hello exhaustion.  

Wednesday morning was early for me and Richard.  He had to work at 7:00 and I had an appointment for initiatories at the temple at 6:30.  We were both out the door shortly after 6:00, leaving the kids and dog sleeping soundly at home.  :)  I was home at 7:20, and was delighted to see an exterior crew at our house!  Because of the remodel, some major patchwork needs to be done on the back of our house as well as the bay window on the west side.  The brick crew worked in the hot sun for two straight days and did a GREAT job!  The drywall crew was also back at 8:00 am.  Yay!  Our house is SO dusty, but I am SO happy with the progress that is being made!  Anyway, back to the morning, I tried to wake Gretchen up at 8:00 for tennis, but she was not having it.  I tried again at 8:15, and could not get her up.  So I gave up and we bagged tennis for the day.  Sigh.  She ended up sleeping until after 9:00, so I guess the sleep was needed!  The girls and I were out the door and bound for Cherry Hill just before 11:00.  We met Stacie and her boys there and had a great time!  Gretchen stuck close to me, but Rachel was off with Jax and Cal and some of their neighbor friends and had a ball.  Unfortunately, we could not stay long and were headed home at 2:00 pm.  Gretchen had dance again that afternoon and that evening Rachel went to a dance conditioning class.  While Rachel was gone, Gretchen and I played with sidewalk chalk and Richard mowed the lawn.  

Thursday we opted for a lazy and relaxing day at home and that was exactly what we needed.  We didn't have any workers inside the house, so that was nice.  I did convince Gretchen to go to tennis in the morning though, and we took Ziggy with us.  Despite her protests, she did end up having a good time!  When we got home, she took Ziggy on her first ever walk all by herself.  She was insistent that she go by herself.  I made sure she had a poop bag ready to go and she promised me she knew how to pick up his poop "because she has seen Bridget do it".  Bless both of them!  They both returned home triumphant!  She was so proud of herself, though disgusted that he did indeed poop, and I was so proud of her too!  She is growing up, and I need to encourage it a lot more, because all I want is for her to stay small.  After lunch, Gretchen played with neighborhood friends for the rest of the afternoon.  They played in her room, outside, and at their house and I was so happy that she just created her own fun with the kids in our circle.  A way a summer afternoon should be spent!  Rachel and I, on the other hand, seriously just laid on the couch and I have zero complaints!  Rachel did have dance at 4:00, so we got out the door for that.  I went to a soccer parent meeting for Marshall at 6:15, Richard did dance pick up and then we grabbed dinner from Waffle Luv.  A good and fun evening.  And speaking of soccer, Marshall has decided to play for yet another year.  He is still with Avalanche, but is with a new coach.  Initially, he said if he didn't make Tyler's team, he would be done, but when it came down to it, he couldn't walk away.  Even though we were kind of hoping he would be done, we think this new coach could be a nice change.  The team has some kids he knows and some he doesn't.  So, here's to another year of balancing school, running, and soccer.  I have talked to his new coach on the phone this week and it was good to meet him in person at the meeting.  I think he will be good!

Friday was a fun day.  I promised the girls an afternoon and evening at Cherry Hill if they could set their alarms and get up and get some things done on Friday morning.  They did it, 98% willingly!  Ha!  We got up, got ready, cleaned the bathroom, and were out the door at 9:45.  Rachel had a private tumbling lesson and Grizz and I hung out in the car.  Then we ran two errands before dropping Rachel off at piano.  Grizz and I came back home, she walked Ziggy, and I made yet more home decisions for the exterior.  Exhausting!  I picked Rachel up from piano, we made lunch, packed dinners, and were out the door just after 1:00 for Cherry Hill!  We picked up two friends, sisters, one Rachel's age, one Gretchen's age and were in the pool just before 2:00 pm.  We stayed until closing at 8:00 and had the best time!  Rachel and Ellie checked in with me every hour or so and they just ran around and played like they owned the place.  They had a blast!  I stuck with Gretchen and Mary Grace.  They practically lived in the lazy river and I just floated along in my water chair-it was bliss!  It did get chillier that evening and we left just as some rain was starting, but it was an all around fantastic time!  We came home, showered, and all fell into bed and slept great!  

Yesterday was a great day.  We were out the door at 9:00 am, just as the drywall crew arrived-perfect timing!  We locked the poor dog in the basement and left him to his own devices.  :)  We drove down to Riverton to go to Dallin's baptism and had the most wonderful morning supporting him and spending time with family.  We got a real treat and got to hold baby Alice for the entire time at the church.  She was a gem!  She has had some major stranger danger the last while, so I have hardly held her, but she did not cry once yesterday.  Rachel and I were in heaven.  She is delectably squishy and looks just like Kevin as a baby.  We adore her.  Dallin's baptism was so great.  All the people who gave talks, prayers, played the piano, etc. were siblings and cousins-it was so wonderful!  Rachel gave the closing prayer and she did a great job.  After the baptism, we went to Ben and Lisa's and spent a good chunk of time there.  We ate great food, the kids played, the adults talked, and it was a great way to spend a Saturday morning.  After we left, we dropped Bridget's trumpet off at Summerhays for it's yearly tune-up, and then we went to a car dealership to test drive more cars.  :)  Richard is agonizing over this decision.  :)  The girls did not want to have any part of this, but they were good sports.  Once we got home, we sorted laundry, and then divided and conquered.  Richard went to Costco, I went to the laundromat, and the girls stayed home and watched TV.  What a life!  We did have a great evening though.  We all folded laundry together (at least we made them help with that!) and then we picked up dinner and took it to my parents' yard.  We let Ziggy run and play and we basked in their shaded yard.  We took the bubble machine too and we just relaxed and played and it was perfect...though there was some whining from a certain ten year old.  :)  

We have had a great day today.  Richard drove to Fruitland this afternoon to pick up Bridget and Cambria and bring them back home.  The noise level in our house increased drastically the minute Bridget walked in the door!  We have not had much time to catch up with her, but she did tell us the highlights over dinner and it sounds like she had a fantastic time!  Many thanks to Bob and Becky for giving her and Cambria another exceptional week.  This evening we were invited over to a friend's home in our neighborhood with some other families and had a great time.  Mocktails and brownies and a fun yard to play in along with baby chicks who got a lot of love for hours on end!  Funny story...before we went, we were trying to explain to Gretchen what a mocktail is, we were clearly not doing a good job because she looked at us and said, with the most earnest little voice, "But I do not like tails in my drink!"

Marshall seems to be thriving over in Europe.  He has sent some great pictures.  On Thursday evening they took a night ferry across the Adriatic Sea and they woke up Friday morning in Greece.  Hello, amazing.  Tomorrow morning he gets on a cruise ship and sets sail for three different Grecian islands and a day in Turkey.  He blew through a lot of money in Italy, but after some texts from us, has slowed down his spending!  Ha!  He gets home late Saturday evening and I cannot wait to have him back.  

Oh, Gretchen also lost two teeth this week!  One had really been bugging her on Thursday and while she was brushing her teeth that night, it fell out!  She was thrilled.  Then, at Cherry Hill on Friday while she was eating a carrot, another one, which didn't seem that wiggly, just fell out!  She was on Cloud 9!  Cutest Bear, with so many gaps in her smile.  Love it.  

Love,

Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel, Gretchen :)

The Leake's Week-June 6, 2024

 Hello!

Before I jump into last week, I have to quickly write about two things I forgot to write about in my 7-week catch up last week!  

First, Rachel was asked to say the opening prayer at stake conference back in April and she did a great job!  The stake executive secretary texted me about it, and when I asked Rachel, she agreed without an ounce of hesitation.  The week leading up to it, I asked her two or three times if she wanted to talk through anything about what she was going to say, and she always told me no.  The morning of, we got to the stake center 30 minutes early to be sure to get a seat in the chapel.  As I was sitting next to her waiting for the meeting to start, I asked her one more time if she wanted to run anything by me and she said, "Mom, I know how to pray!"  Indeed she does.  I was done asking her if she wanted help after that!  She confidently walked up to the stand as the opening song was ending and gave the sweetest prayer.  It was slow and heartfelt and so thoughtful.  A primary age boy gave the closing prayer, and his was the same.  Intentional and thoughtful.  But also simple.  It was wonderful to have two primary kids give those prayers and I was so proud of Rachel for saying yes to that opportunity.  

And speaking of primary...I was released from the primary presidency two weeks ago.  Our presidency had been in for just over three years, and the bishop decided our time was done.  Rachel and Gretchen have been especially sad to see me go.  I have been in the primary since before our stake came back to the second hour of church during Covid!  I have been a primary staple for those two!  I am really, really grateful for the time I had to serve in there though.  I have had a handful of primary callings over the years, and honestly, I have not loved any of them!  This presidency was different though, and I genuinely enjoyed myself.  Lots of small testimony building experiences, especially during singing time.  I am currently without a calling, so we will wait and see what is next!

Okay!  Here's a rundown of our first week of summer!

Richard had to work on Memorial Day.  We really did absolutely nothing exciting.  Rachel had a tumbling private lesson and Bridget worked at the farm.  A lame Memorial Day.  Bridget, Gretchen, and Marshall did hang with friends, so that was good, but Rachel and I just chilled at home...zero complaints with me.  Oh yes, we did get the results of dance tryouts on Monday morning, much sooner than we were anticipating.  Gretchen made a competition team!  Yay!  Go Grizz.  She is on Mini and I think it will be a great fit for her.  Rachel made Junior AIM, which we were totally anticipating and were so happy about.  Because she made an AIM team she gets to go to nationals again next summer, so she is thrilled.  So we lived on Cloud 9 for a bit, but then we got word that Sara made a different team and we were heartbroken.  Ugh.  I honestly wanted to throw up.  Rachel and Sara have danced together for the last five years and have made the same team for all three years they have done competition.  Rachel and Sara's schedules have been 100% synced and her mom, Meri, is my carpool lifeline.  It is going to be a doozy for both of us.  Rachel, to her credit, is taking this okay.  Almost all of her team stuck together, and she gets along well with all of them.  It will be a fun year, even without Sara, and Meri and I are just praying they will be back on the same team again next year.  I think I am handling it worse than Rachel!  Wah!  

Tuesday felt like our first "real" day of summer...kids home and Richard at work.  Rachel and Bridget had a piano lesson at 9:00 am and their piano teacher lives very close to Gretchen's beloved friends, Afton and Evelyn.  So after I dropped my girls off at piano, Gretchen and I picked up her friends and they played at the park for an hour.  It was perfect.  The Hopes were kind enough to let Gretchen stay and play at their house for the rest of the day, so it was really a win-win for all of us!  Marshall had an orthodontist appointment (we'll see if he ever gets these braces off!).  After lunch, the three other kids all took off with friends and I went to Cabinet World to finalize all our cabinet decisions!  Both stressful and exciting!  

Richard had Wednesday off of work...so many days off in May!  Zero complaints here!  Richard and Marshall ran errands in the morning, with Marshall driving, and Marshall got his haircut.  Bridget practiced with her goats at the farm and then went to horseback riding that afternoon.  Marshall had soccer tryouts that evening and Richard stayed and watched.  The girls and I relaxed at home and that felt great.  

Thursday the kids were great sports and set their alarms so we could be out of the house at 9:30 am with all our laundry!  Marshall drove us to and from the laundromat and did great-we are trying to have him drive as much as possible this summer!  The kids were really so wonderful as we did all our laundry-they've got this down!  After we got home and took care of said laundry, I took Marshall out for lunch.  We picked up In-N-Out and then ate at the park.  I am so glad I had that time with him.  I was bordering on being a wreck about him leaving for Europe, so he was a great sport and let me spend time with him and run him through scenario after scenario and give him all advice I could think of!  After we got home, I quickly packed and then the girls and I were in the car on our way to Logan about 2:15!  Logan goat show!  We got up to the hotel in Logan right around 3:30.  Once we got in our room, the girls were in swimsuits within minutes and we were at the pool with Cambria and her family.  The kids had a ball and played and played.  After showers and dinner, we met up with Cambria's family again at a park.  It was a perfect evening.  We found a park with a great playground, tons of grass, huge trees, and a river.  It was a great way to spend an evening.  The kids ran and played and expended even more energy and Melanie and I loved talking with each other!  We leff a little after 8:00 pm, relaxed in our hotel room for a bit, and then called it a night.  Rachel and Gretchen fell asleep quickly, but Bridget and I tossed and turned until after midnight!  It was maddening!  And neither of us slept well either so when the alarm went off at 6:20, it was a tad painful!  

Friday obviously began early.  Bridget and Cambria did breakfast at the hotel at 6:30, and then I dropped them off at the fairgrounds at 7:00 am!  They spent the next 2 1/2 hours helping the Garlicks and cleaning their goats.  It was a chilly morning, so the Garlicks opted to not bathe the goats, instead they just cleaned their hooves and rear ends-sounds so lovely!  Gag!  Back at the hotel, the other kids were able to sleep in, we had a later breakfast, checked out about 9:15, and were to the fairgrounds just minutes later.  The show was supposed to start at 9:30, but these things always seem to start late, but things were underway a little before 10:00.  Showmanship comes first (that is where the person is judged based on knowledge, handling of the goat, interactions with the judge, etc.)  Bridget is in the junior age group, which is second.  Bridget has been pretty diligent practicing with her goats at the farm and studying even more than she usually does.  During senior showmanship, Bridget watched the judge and could tell that she was very thorough and got a good idea of what this was going to be like.  When it was Bridget's turn, she confidently walked into the ring with her goat, Ophelia, and was in there for the next 45 minutes!  The judge had them do a couple of maneuvers, which they have to execute correctly, she talked with each of them one on one and asked about terminology and the good physical characteristics of their goat and what they would change.  She also had them switch goats, so they were working with a different goat that they don't know.  She was very thorough!  Through it all Bridget did absolutely great, so great!  She took first in showmanship, out of 12 kids in her age group!  She has been showing goats for four year and this is her first time getting first in showmanship.  I was so proud of her!  At the end the judge has to say why she placed everyone the way she did and the judge spoke so highly of Bridget! Go B!!!  The rest of the day was downhill from there.  Ha!  The judge maintained her thorough-ness and the show finally ended at 9:57 pm.  Good grief!  A youth goat show that lasted over 12 hours!  Bridget, of course, was amazing and didn't complain once-I cannot say the same for the rest of us!  It is a beautiful setting up there, and there were plenty of kids to play with.  For the most part, Rachel and Gretchen did great.  They were in and out of swim suits and played in the water with the Garlick's grandkids, and other kids.  There is tons of grass and so much shade, Gretchen ran back and forth to her heart's content.  I took a nap on the grass under the shade and I could have slept there for hours!  At 5:00, Gretchen was begging me to take her home, and in my head I knew I could drive home from Logan, drop her off, and drive back up to Logan and the show still wouldn't be done, but I did not have it in my to spend 3 plus hours in the car!  Gretchen was a good sport about me telling her no and we all very eagerly piled in the car at 10:00 pm and finally drove home!

Richard did work on Friday, so Marshall was flying solo that day, and I am sure loving it!  He packed for his trip, mowed the lawn, and maybe cleaned his bathroom.  :)  He had his last night of soccer tryouts that evening, so he and Richard went and did that.  When I got home at 11:15 pm, cute, sweaty, Marshall was downstairs waiting for me to help him finish up a few things for his trip.  I actually loved that he stayed up and waited for me.  He was happy and cool as a cucumber and seemed to have zero nerves about his big trip in the morning.  

The other big thing on Friday is that sheetrock was hung in our house!!!  I was so eager to see Marshall, that I just went straight downstairs as soon as I got home.  When I finally made it back up to the main floor just after midnight, I seriously just stood on our main floor, and using my phone's flashlight, took it all in for a good ten minutes!  Ha!  It was so fun to see walls!!!  This project is nowhere near to being done, but seeing new walls up, after almost four months of no walls, did my heart some good!  

Richard, Marshall and I were up early Saturday morning.  Once again, Marshall seemed completely himself, no apparent nerves on the surface.  We were out the door at 8:00 am and on our way to the airport.  We parked in the parking garage and walked into the American Airlines check-in counter.  We found his group, got his bag checked, he met his buddy/roommate, touched base with all three adult leaders, and then Marshall told us we could go!  I had already started crying on the way to the airport, but composed myself enough to get us in there, but when I hugged him and literally clung to him, I lost it all over again!  Gosh.  After Richard hugged him, he took my hand and walked me out of the airport with tears streaming down my face the entire time!  I was a wreck!  I cried all the way home, came home, got in bed, cried more, tried to sleep, slept, woke up, and cried more.  This pattern more or less continued the rest of the day!  Thank heavens, Richard did not work all weekend.  He was the go-to parent for all of Saturday.  Between exhaustion and the emotions of sending my oldest child to Europe for two weeks, I was out of commission!  

A little background on this trip...a former teacher at the junior high and Marshall's school counselor have been doing these trips, with EF Traveler, for over 20 years.  They are well seasoned travelers who for some reason love taking dozens of teenagers somewhere every summer!  Marshall was invited on this trip as a 7th grader and could have gone to Australia and New Zealand last summer.  Even though Marshall really wanted to go, neither Richard or I felt good about sending him away for that long.  So as an 8th grader he got invited on this current trip and we did feel a lot better about it.  He is almost 16, going into his sophomore year, so we signed him up almost 2 years ago!  I am actually really glad we waited until this summer, because in the last year he has done so much travel without us, and that has been good for us and him!  That is not to say we honestly tried to talk him out of this trip earlier this year!  Ha!  But, he has not wavered once.  So, I finally decided to trust him and let him go.  Clearly, it ripped my heart out, but I am doing much better now!  Anyway, they flew to Dallas and then took a flight to Rome.  They arrived in Rome early afternoon on Sunday.  They have done a couple of days in Rome, Florence, and today it looks like they are on the eastern coast of Italy and soon they will make their way to Greece!  Trip of a lifetime.  

We did ask him to text us one picture a day, and he has been very good at doing that.  The sights he is seeing are incredible!  He tells me he is happy and having a great time!  I did wake up on Sunday morning feeling SO much better.  I have not cried anymore, I have just felt so excited for him, and also super proud of him.  He is not friends with any kids on this trip.  He has told me for months that he knows who they all are and that they are nice kids-I sure hope so!

Real quick, back to things at home...after an emotional Saturday, where Richard and I did test drive cars, the girls played and we went to an outstanding ward party, luau style, we all fell into bed and slept very well that night!

Sunday morning Bridget was up early to work at the farm and help the Garlicks out since they were still in Logan.  After church and some downtime at home, Richard left with Bridget, picked up Cambria and met his mom in Fruitland.  So yes, I had to say good-bye to one more child!  My heart!  Richard wanted to send Ziggy out to Vernal too because of how much work is being done in our house the next couple of weeks, but I told Richard I could not handle saying good-bye to one more living thing, so the dog had to stay!  Ha!  But Bridget and Cambria made it out safely to Vernal and are living their best lives out there.  I have not heard a thing from them or Bob and Becky, so I am just telling myself that no news is good news!  

I will call it good there!  This has seriously taken me three days to write.  

Love each of you.

Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel and Gretchen :)