save the date

(warning: this post has several references to bodily functions, but I was really trying to capture the female wackiness I was experiencing. It might be a little early to post this, but I really think Amy is the only person who reads this, so I think our situation is safe.)

(originally written January 12, 2010 at around 3am)

I think I’m still in shock. After a week, my suspicions were confirmed today. We are pregnant.

For a week now, I’ve noticed little signs – waves of nausea that come and go at night. My boobs have been really sore and I even think they’re bigger. I feel really bloated and I pee a lot. That’s a lot of personal information to put in writing, but computers are made for editing down the road…

We took a couple of generic brand pregnancy tests – there was a faded “plus” sign – the vertical line was bright, but the horizontal line was faint and the instructions said this meant “inconclusive”. Then we splurged on the EPT brand (I’ve hit a new level of cheapness when I want to save money on a pregnancy test – but in my defense, they’re $20 for two EPT tests!…but I digress). The result was the same as the generic brand – bright vertical line, faint horizontal line, but a “plus” still the same. And EPT is much more confident about this grey area – a plus by any shade is still a plus.

Four faint positive pregnancy tests later, I couldn’t take the uncertainty and made an appointment for a pregnancy test. I remember hearing the word “positive”. I remember asking if she was sure. And I remember the word “definitely.” That’s when I went into shock.

Not that we don’t want children – we really do, but we weren’t prepared for this. After a year and a half of the Que Sera Sera method, we really didn’t think we would get pregnant. I was happily searching adoption, foster care and other options. Those routes were just as meaningful and fulfilling to me as having our own birth children.

Actually, my emotional status each month as my cycle approached was as unpredictable as it was just plain wacky. About a week before my period was due, I would start panicking that I was pregnant. I started getting scared about having a baby at age 44 – about whether this old body was up to the task, about sleep deprivation at a stage where I’ve FINALLY overcome my insomnia (well, about 75% of the time which is a VAST improvement), and so on.

And then my period would start and instead of being relieved, I would be sad. Sometimes very sad. Sometimes just a little. And then I’d go look up the dates of my next fertile opportunity. Then I would wonder, if I was this wacky sans pregnancy hormones, what kind of Jekyl and Hyde creature would emerge should the fertility gods smile upon us?

We will soon find out.

But after a brief denial stage, I am happy and excited…and scared and nervous. And man, am I peeing a lot.

p.s. save the date for September 17th!

disappointment

Last Sunday I taught my Mia Maid girls about trials. Personally, I thought it was a good lesson. We talked about the earthquake in Haiti, the impoverished family in Peru that we’re helping, and lots of other things. We made a list of different trials that people experience. We came up with 15 different trials including abuse, addiction, emotional disorders, natural disasters, divorce and family relationship problems, etc. Then I asked each of the girls to raise their hand if they knew one person who has experienced one of these trials. They kept their hands up as I raised the ante…two trials, three trials, four…

Every one of the girls had their hands up through 14 and some had their hands up for all 15 of the trials. Then I asked them how many of those trials they thought they might possibly go through. They said “all of them”.

But it wasn’t a sad lesson. In fact, when I played the devil’s advocate and asked them why Heavenly Father would let these things happen to them, one of them said, “suffering isn’t punishment, it’s a test”. I almost cried at the faith of these girls. Some of them have had some tough trials already in their young lives and the temptations they have to deal with are so much different than when I was their age.

So a few days later, I’m dealing with my own disappointment. It isn’t anywhere close to what those poor people in Haiti are suffering, but it has my head spinning and I’m struggling not to become angry. I received an email yesterday informing me that we aren’t going to be able to bring Adriel here to go to school. I don’t fully understand the reasons. All I understand is there is a young man who deserves everything the world has to offer and we can’t help him.

Part of me wants to fight. I think we could win. But in my prayers last night, when I said I would do whatever Heavenly Father wants me to, I meant it.

Instead of fighting to bring Adriel here, we are going to start working on getting him on a mission when he turns 19 in December. And that, I sincerely believe, is His will.

more or less....dos

So half a month into the new decade, I thought I’d weigh in on my goals.

I’m drinking more water and less caffeine (actually, as of last Sunday, I've upgraded to no caffeine)

I’m exercising more, but I’ve also gained weight (more on this later…)

I’m writing more. It’s tough writing a Don Taylor worthy posting each time on this blog, but I try. I’ve also written Chapter One on my novel. Tony really liked it. (Chapter Two is MUCH tougher than Chapter One.)

I baked a cheesecake (and it was yummy).

I’m reading my scriptures more (but have missed several days still), we’re going to the temple on Thursday (and in the past week, I’ve been praying a TON).

But it’s not all pretty. I still waste a ton of time and am so unorganized it feels unhealthy.

And the insomnia thing? It’s 4:15 am.

Half the Sky

I’m reading a fascinating book called “Half the Sky” by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (thanks Lisa). I believe every woman, every person who is married to a woman or every person who born by a woman needs to read this book. But be forewarned, it will make you cry.

“Half the Sky” tells story after story about women, primarily in third world countries, who are abused, neglected, persecuted, raped, murdered, kidnapped and trafficked and left to die. Their belief is 107 MILLION women are missing from the earth today because they either die (as a baby, child, girl or woman from causes that are preventable such as maternal mortality), are murdered (women in many countries are considered expendable and replaceable), or are kidnapped and forced into sex slavery.

107 MILLION women

Sometimes I get completely overwhelmed with the amount of desperate need there is in the world. I want to feed orphans, educate children, house the homeless, bring water to the waterless, and heal the sick. I told Tony about a recently graduated college student who decided she would go to the Congo to see what she could do to help. She works in a fistula hospital and in addition to the medical assistance she’s able to give, has started a school for children and teaches skills to the women in the hospital. It made my child sponsorships and quilt making projects seem, well, worthless. It’s not worthless, but I want to do more. Tony listened to me and said, maybe after we pay off the remodel in a few years we can move to Africa.

Of all the humanitarian work I’m interested in, I realize the importance of focusing on women. I’ve spent a lot of time helping orphanages and drop-in centers which feed children. I still believe in those programs, but I also believe orphanages create orphans.

When you focus on helping a woman, you are not only preventing the birth of an orphan, but you will most likely help that woman’s children and the community. It’s been studied and proven over and over that when you educate/help a woman, the first thing she does is educate and care for her children. The best way to fight terrorism would be to educate people, primarily women (this is what Greg Mortensen focuses on in Three Cups of Tea).

What I love about this book is it also tells the stories about people who are doing something about it. And it tells about what we can do to help. There are lots of things every one of us can do. And here are a few of those things:

1. Read the book (or if you don’t have time, call me and I’ll tell you a story daily).
2. Sponsor a woman - I'll post the websites soon!
3. Donate.
4. Go on an expedition.
5. Care. Be an ambassador and spread the word.
Whatever you do, please don’t think about how terrible the state of women in third world countries is and do nothing. I haven’t yet decided my course of action, but I am touched by the stories and inspired by those who labor to change our world for the better. I have several thoughts and ideas – we’ll see where they take me.

And even though it isn’t much, I’ll continue making quilts even if it only means one more warm person in the world.

flashback friday

(note: I wrote this for Southern Cross' blog a few weeks ago. EVERY time I do laundry, I think about washing clothes in the dirty Urabamba River....here's the flashback... )

My sister's clothes dryer broke down this week and she's been having a hard time getting someone out to fix it. Normally, she tries to do at least one load a day. With 3 kids and a husband, you can imagine how her laundry is piling up. After spending almost 3 hours in the laundromat her first time, we decided she'd use our dryer.

I can't convince her to just drop off her dirty laundry and let me do both the washing and the drying so she washes a few loads, puts 2 loads of washed clothes in a hamper thing, loads them into her SUV and drives them down to me. I dry them, fold them and she picks them up when she drops off her next 2 loads of wet clothes.

It's quite a process, but we've got it down. And it's fun seeing my sister every couple of hours throughout a day. But it did make us wonder, "how did mom do it with SIX kids?"

But I still say doing laundry for a family of eight has nothing on the experiences I had doing laundry down in Peru. Have you ever done laundry for 30+ kids in a third-world country that doesn't have a washing machine, clothes dryer let alone RUNNING WATER?


Let me tell you, THAT is a process. I remember just getting all the kids together with the laundry bags and their laundry tubs was an exhausting task. Then we paraded down the hill about a mile carrying these heavy bags of clothes. Then we washed EACH piece of clothing one by one in freezing river water. The first time we didn't even have enough tubs or hand brushes to go around. And let me tell you, it goes a lot quicker when you have brushes. When you don't, you just hold fabric in each fist and rub the fabric together. The kids would laugh because my fingers were all cut up.
After we got the clothes all washed and rinsed in the (not so clean) river water, we twist and twist the clothes to get as much water out before we hauled the wet clothes back up the hill a mile. Did you know that wet clothes are MUCH heavier than dry clothes?

Then we'd hang the clothes out to dry for the day on a barb-wired fence which explained all the little holes in the kids' clothes.

So yes, it's a total pain for my sister to bring her wet clothes to me, but she's got nothing on those Peruvian kids.

behold the cheesecake

So this is me tackling the goal of making foods that scare me. Cheesecake has always been scary to me. But look. I made one and if I do say so myself, it was delicious.

The recipe is from the Magnolia Cookbook and since people asked for it, here's the recipe:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Crust: In a medium-sized bowl, combine 1 cup flour with 1/4 cup powdered sugar and 1 cup finely chopped toasted almonds. Cut in the butter until the ixture resembles coarse crumbs. Press into the bottom of a buttered 10-inch springform pan. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and cook on rack.

Filling: In a large bowl, on the low speed of a mixer, beat 2 pounds (4 eight-once packages) of cream cheese until VERY smooth. Gradually add 1 1/4 cups sugar. Add 5 large eggs, one at a time. Make sure you stop the mixer several times and scrape the sides and bottom of the boal. Stir in 2 TB heavy cream and 1 TB vanilla.

Pour the batter into the pan and set the pan on a baking sheet. Bake until edges are set and center momves only slightly when pan is shaken, about an hour. Remove the cheesecake to add topping.

Topping: 3 chopped heath bars (3/4 cup) and 3/4 cup chopped toasted almonds. Sprinkle both evenly ove the top of cake and return to oven to cool. Turn off the heat and using a wooden spoon to keep oven door slightly ajar, cook cake in oven for 1 hour before removing. Cover and refrigerate for 12 hours.

Remove cake from refrigerator at least 15-30 inutes before cutting and serving.

more and less

I’ve always been a big goal maker. When I lived in California, I used to make an annual pilgrimage around New Years Day down to Carmel. I would go by myself and make a day of it. It was always the same routine – get a pretzel and a steamed cocoa at the bakery on Ocean Avenue and then walk down the beach. I love that beach. It is beautiful and if I ever work with a psychiatrist who tells me I need to imagine my happy place, this would be it. I remember taking Marc Shinsato there, a friend from Hawaii and when he saw my beach he just said in a low voice….wow.

Anyway, I would sit on that beach and think. I would think about the past year and my life in general. I would think about all kinds of things and at the end of the day I would write my goals for the upcoming year. During the day I would write about things too. It was always a good day.

Tony and I have been reviewing the last year and talking about goals the past few days. 2008 was a really good year. On a scale from 1 to 10, I think I’d give it an 8. The reason I’d give it an 8 is because a couple of big things didn’t happen. We didn’t go to the Sunflower Orphanage for one – after going 6 times – about every six months for the past 3 years, I’m having major withdrawals. But I’ll write about that stuff sometime later.

But the stuff that did happen this past year was great. We spent a lot of time working on architectural plans and after several rounds, came up with a great plan and we started construction. We got a dog that we love. We both work with the youth at church and love them. I traveled less due to the economy, but we both still have great jobs. We took some small trips to Moab, Lake Powell and California. Trent and Sarah got married and we saw family quite a bit.

So yes. It was a good year.

And 2010? Well, our house should be done next month. We’re getting a piano. And hopefully our family will expand (I’ll introduce you to Adriel soon).

So contrary to Tony’s repeated explanations that my goals should be quantifiable, the title of my list of goals is:

More or Less.

drink more water.
exercise more.
write more. In addition to this blog, I’m going to start writing a novel. I’ve had the idea in my head for awhile, but the task scares the crap out of me.
use my time more wisely.
try recipes of foods that scare me more.
pray more.
read scriptures more.
attend the temple more. We used to go once a week and want to get back into that schedule.
help Tony around the house more (he does the cooking, shopping and laundry).
be more grateful.
talk to my family and friends more.

eat less sugar.
drink less caffeine. Flying across the country is a lot different than flying to Reno and I’ve picked up a Coke Zero habit which probably contributes to my insomnia.
say words like “crap” less.
complain about Utah’s winter less. It is cold here, but I will try to embrace it. I will also try to leave the house at least once each day (I’m known to go days DAYS without leaving the house).
sleep more and less (more before midnight, less after).

What are your goals?

the fruits of insomnia

I am an insomniac. My parents tell me I was even a terrible sleeper as a newborn. They would resort to driving me around in their car at night to get me to fall asleep. My dad would drive as my mom rocked me in her arms as they drove around the neighborhood. My mom still tells me that she’s surprised they had more children after me.

Other than chronic fatigue, my insomnia doesn’t really affect me that much except I tend to think about things I might not typically think about during normal daylight hours. To my credit, I’ve only made one late-night shopping network purchase and that turned out to be a very useful velcro’d headset that turned a phone into a hands-free device, which back in the early 90’s, was a rare and beautiful thing.

During an especially persistent sleepless spell in December of 2008, I discovered 2 minute videos from the Humane Society on the On-Demand Channel. In the wee hours I would watch video after video of dogs that we needed to rescue from a life behind bars. And that’s how we ended up with Abby – the best yellow lab in the whole world. A year later, I’m tempted to watch my favorite dog-on-demand channel again…I think Abby needs a younger brother or sister…

So last night I made my first ever cheesecake (one of my NY resolutions is to try new recipes of foods that have previously frightened me – cheesecake, soufflé, and fillo dough to name a few.) The problem is I started making this around 9pm and it takes 2 hours of baking – I obviously failed to read the bake times before I started the process. We had already decided we would celebrate New Years Eve on Eastern Standard Time, but my cheesecake foiled that plan.

After Tony went to bed, I summoned my insomnia while I waited for my cheesecake to do its thing. This year instead of shopping for dogs to rescue, I shopped for children. I realize that sounds shocking. That’s because it is.

Last year as I shopped for dogs, I would go through a list and narrow down the characteristics we were looking for in a dog. Breed, size, sex, color, age, special needs.

Last night I looked at websites about foster child adoption in Utah. And once again, I read a list of characteristics to narrow down the type of child we would consider. The first section was easy. Race - any, gender - any, age - 0 to 18, sibling group – yes. How many? Let’s say 4 max (yikes!).

Then I had to choose the special needs we would consider. Which would we consider: a mild, moderate or severe emotional/behavioral need? What about a physical, developmental or learning special need? Then they asked yes or no questions.

Sexually Abused: Yes or No
Drug Exposed: Yes or No
ADHD: Yes or No

And so on. I went through the process several times and came up with a list of 5 different children. All of them beautiful and deserving of a loving home. But I found the process jarring and disturbing….and helpful. I suppose the part that disturbs me is that I selected NO on considering a sexually abused or an ADHD child.

I could write about all the reasons why this is reasonable and justifiable. After all, we did the same thing when shopping for Abby. But what if they had a category for shedding hair? If I had selected mild instead of severe, maybe we never would have found Abby. And look how much I love her in spite of dog hair and having to vacuum everyday. But I’m just going to leave the child categorization at this. It disturbs me.

But who knows. The fruits of 2009’s insomnia brought Abby into our life. Maybe we’ll see a child join our family in 2010. Maybe this child will be categorized in the mild, medium or severe category, and maybe we will love him and think he’s the best kid in the world.