Sister's Trip

When my older sister turned 40, she wanted to go on a trip to celebrate.  She invited us to go to Disneyland with her.  This year was my 40th.  I chose to go on a cruise.  I had never been and my older sister's husband would never want to go with her so we all decided it would be a great opportunity.  And that is exactly what it was.  

Here we are in Texas preparing a trio to sing during the karaoke nights.  Like true musicians, we spents months picking the right song, making sure they key was right, listening to recordings and adjusting the sheet music to the mp3, and practicing our parts.  When we got on the ship, we learned they didn't have that song and couldn't play the file from our cd.  We were bummed but improvised by picking a song they had on their system and pulling off a lame but entertaining performance.  

Our first day was a sea day from Galveston to Cozumel.  We relaxed, ate food we didn't prepare, left our dishes on the tables, participated in a handful of activities they offered on the ship, and giggled our way through the day.  

Our first excursion was in Cozumel.  We chose to relax at a resort that offered food, relaxing beach time, and snorkeling.  

 If you read my first snorkeling experience in Miami, you will understand what a miracle it was for me to try again.  It was a blast and I can't wait to try it again.  

Our second excursion was in Progreso.  We found  local company that catered a day to what we wanted to do.  We had a personal guide that spoke English, had cold drinks in an air-conditioned car, and was a fantastic tour guide.  

We first went to the Mayapan ruins.  My skin felt like the sun was 12 inches from my face and it was only in the 80s.  Boy, my british skin was suffering!

We climed this tower where the "stairs" were bumpy rocks that were much shorter than our Clark feet.  

 Our guide then drove us to a cenote' (underground spring).  I had promised myself that I would swim in the water no matter how nervous I was.  When we approached the hole in the ground, I quickly changed my mind.  After a few minutes, I realized I'd regret not trying.  

It was a very deep cave and we had to climb down these rotted "pirate cave" stairs. 

 Proof!

No, I didn't like it.  

 After the cenote, we drove to this woman's house were she had prepared a lunch of pork tacos.  Her home was clean and welcoming and I realized how lucky I am and how luxurious my life is.  (I really wanted to try her homemade salsa but we had been warned to stay away from any food that hadn't been cooked.) 

This was our guide, Guilmer.  The poor guy had to drive us around, all day, and listen to our non-stop jabbering.

Our last day was another day at sea.  We enjoyed more games, karoake, food, relaxation, and plenty more giggling.

Parting is such sweet sorrow!

Caleb's First Stitches (Warning: Pictures of wound)

We had an adventure last night.  Caleb and Blake have been fighting a lot lately.  Fists and palm smacking have been coming out.  Well, I was getting Sunday dinner on the table and I heard Caleb shriek and then Jeff said, "Risae.....We have a hole in the head."  I ran downstairs and sure enough, Caleb had a deep laceration in the middle of his forehead.  I clamped my had over it.  I told Dad to run and get a cold wet rag.  (Caleb hit Blake, Blake then ran at Caleb in retaliation and Caleb fell and hit the corner of the coffee table.)  

Katie and Kyle jumped into action.  They helped get a wet rag, get his shoes on, got my shoes on while I held the rag to his head, and helped us to the car.  Jeff knew right away that it was not a 1 parent job.  We got to the emergency room. Caleb had been shaking with fear since it happened.  I was worried he was going into shock.  

They got us in a room.  It took them a long time to irrigate the wound with the saline solution.  It was hard for Caleb to lay still while they squirted water on his head.  When the water went down over his closed eyelids, we had to take a few breaks.   Then, they put a numbing gel on the wound and wrapped it with tape for 1/2 hour.  Next, they came in and started prepping for the stitches.  Every time they covered his face with the rag and grabbed his head to stabilize him, he turned and saw them prepping the syringe.  I told them I was 100% sure he wouldn't be able to do this.  They agreed.  They came back in and gave him a shot in his leg with the anesthesia.  (Oh-after I had to force feed him a dissolving zofran anti nausea pill).  He feel asleep quickly and they went to work.  He kept wiggling his hand where they put a heart monitor on his finger.  I told them how sensitive his fingers are and shared my experiences with trimming his nails.  They laughed and then said, "Hey, you should take advantage of the sedation and trim his nails now!"  I looked in my purse and found some clippers.  It was funny to see him still jerk his hands and feet around.  They couldn't believe how he was still fighting that much while under the anesthesia.  

He took a while to wake up and it was funny to see him try to rip off the finger monitor and heart pressure arm wrap.  Then, we had to help him walk to the car because he was so wobbly.  We got to bed around 10:30.  I kept him home from school the next day because I was worried he'd be in a funky mood all day.  He actually did great that day and went to school the following day.  I am so grateful for those wonderful docctors and nurses who were so patient.  

This year's Christmas chain needed to be different.  I decided to make it out of very large strips of paper.  Blake and Caleb had a great time helping me.  

This was the only place we could hang it where it wouldn't hit the floor and we could still access the chain to cut off the last week. 

Thanksgiving

We have thought about going to Golden Corrall for Thanksgiving for a few years.  Some friends raved about how nice it was to let the kids eat ice cream, no food prep, no decorating tables, and no dishes.  We ended up selling a bunch of stuff we didn't want anymore on classifieds.  We made enough money to take the kids.  

Caleb won the award for the least amount of "Thanksgiving" food items.  He ate a taco shell, one bite of a chocolate covered marshmallow, chocolate milk, and some chocolate ice cream.

Blake was a great eater.  He loved the rolls.  He mentioned it many times and then said, "Mom, these are better than yours!"

Uncle Brent came up from Arizona and we enjoyed his company for a few days.

Pardon the food in my cheek.  I wasn't paying attention to taking a great selfie.  I was hurrying to get more of the yams in my mouth!  Yummmm

Caleb Bowling - Halloween

 Caleb finally got to do bowling with Special Olympics.  We have been waiting for bowling season since we started basketball in January.  

I love this photo sequence.  It is what he did every time.  He would make it back to his seat before the ball knocked over the pins.  It was cracking me up.  

 He had so much fun!

 Caleb was Spider man

Blake was Bumblebee (The Transformer)

Katie was a Warriors fan

I was lame and didn't very good pictures of their costumes.  Look closely and you can see Blake in his yellow costume.  In the picture in front of the house, you can see Caleb in his Spiderman costume on the front porch.  

Tchau, Elder Carlson

 Elder Carlson was set apart on Monday, October 30th.  Here's a picture of him with the last 4 of the "Homies".

Bryce Hugh, Joshua, Ben Berlin, and Spencer Robinson.  

We packed all his suitcases that day.  After weighing them with all the necessities, we still had over 40 pounds to fill.  We sent 10 anti-perspirants, 2 big shampoos, 2 giant peanut butters, 3 bars of soap, 5 tubes of toothpaste, and more stuff we knew they can't get in Brazil.  

We also had room to pack him a Christmas package.  It was nice because they cost a lot of money to send, and if they actually get to the missionary, the government charges the receiver a large custom fee to accept the package.  

We gave him an "after Thanksgiving day" package with 4 stockings for his apartment mates, 2 packages of cookie mixes, and paper strips cut out of green and red paper to make a Christmas countdown chain.  For his Christmas package, here's a picture of what we sent.  American treats, card games to play on Pday, stickers to hand out to local kids, microfiber towels that dry well in the humidity, and duct tape.  (All the posts about things Brazilian missionaries appreciate said duct tape.  ???)

Tuesday, October 30th at 7:00 a.m.

Salt Lake Airport

Plenty of help with suitcases!

This ticket agent was quite helpful with getting Josh his boarding passes printed off.  However, he opened Josh's passport and ripped out some visa papers he needed to enter the country.  The instructions from the church specifically said not to remove the papers stapled in his passport.  We were scared but there was nothing we could do about it now.  

Everybody got a hug.  Josh said, "Well, goodbye guys", turned around and walked to security.

After that ankle delay, he was more than ready to get going.  

After a few turns on the people mover, we headed home.

I called the church's travel office as soon as we got home to tell them about the visa papers that were torn out of the passport.  They said he'd be fine as long as he had the papers with him.  They have too many missionaries lose the papers before they get to the new country.  They asked who it was so they could call and talk to Delta to make sure they don't keep doing this.  

Later that afternoon, I got a text from this man.  He sat next to Josh on the plane.  He was a member of our church.  He sent me this picture of Josh and said he was happy and ready to get to Brazil.  I texted the man my thanks and told him to tell Josh that he didn't need to worry about his visa papers.  

He sent me this picture as they left the plane in Atlanta.  He said they talked a lot about different ways to handle discussing the church.  He was confident in Josh's abilities and passion.  What a sweet balm for this mommy's heart.