Perspective

Must Be Spring

I mowed the lawn yesterday, the first time this season.  The new mowed grass smells heavenly.  I also picked dandelions.  Seems if you pick them pretty consistently they will be gone in two years, at least according to one of my Sandpoint sources.  I'll see how long my resolve lasts.

What is the other sign?  I noted making toast this morning I didn't have to re-soften the butter sitting on the counter over night.  It was warm enough in the house not to harden it.  Toast with crabapple jelly from last fall was yummy.

The deer are in the back pasture.  The kitties are hunting up a storm, dead vole and mice  are everywhere.  The "Pride" is functioning at a high level.  Sis and Maggie hunt and drop their kill at the feet of Angus Kahn.  He proceeds to play lazily as if he has worn himself out in stalking the prey.  His hunting prowess is comical.  it has taken him weeks to figure out how to get his fat belly on the ground, but his fat tail is straight up twitching back and forth.  He is having a hard time developing his stealth.

Just finished 2 miles, the first run/walk since fall.  It felt good to be outside running.  Clean sheets are on the line in the sunshine.  Going to sleep tonight will be extra nice.

Yesterday we had Stake Conference it was televised from Salt Lake.  Elder Hales presided, Elder Nash, Sister Burton and Brother Osguthorpe all spoke.  For me it is one of the best conferences I have participated in in a long time.  All four talks dealt with the basics that we have been aware of and as families have done for years.  Personal, family, and couple prayer, scripture study and Family Home Evening were all talked about.  As basic as these concepts are there were some things I learned that I would love to pass on.

I wrote pages of notes but will share Elder Hales pattern of prayer.  It seemed to challenge me to another level of communication with Heavenly Father.

*First acknowledge to the Lord your willingness to be obedient and your efforts to do so. (This caused me some real reflection)

*Next he suggests we visit with the Lord about our struggles and needs.  Ask specifically what the Lord would have me do in relationship to those needs.

*Real expressions of gratitude.

*Time to ponder and reflect.

*Writing down our impressions acknowledges our receipt of them.

* Expressing gratitude in our next communication for those things we have received.

My first thought was “how will I find the time to do this?”  I find the answer for me is again re-evaluating my use of time.  Good, better, best.

computer cords

I have spent the morning trying to make sense of the mess of wires behind the computer.  Very SCAREY!!!!  After doing a little research on the internet I followed a pretty easy and inexpensive solution.  No pictures but I hope easy to explain.  I combines all the cords and wires say from the screen.  They are bunches together with several small zip ties.  These are a lot less expensive than the computer ties from Staples.  They will have to be snipped if for any reason I need to unbunch them, but that shouldn't have to happen too often.  After zipping them together I took some gray pipe insulation,(it looks like a long piece of gray pipe but is foam.) The foam is sliced vertically from end to end. I cut the desired length for the bunched wires and opened the slice and inserted the cords.  Nelson mounted two surge protectors on the wall behind the desk.  Now there are no wires on the floor and on the cords desk are verymanagable.  Looks so much better and should make dusting and sweeping a lot nicer.

Sharing Family History

Melani has been coaching me thru the Drop Box experience. Drop Box is free storage system for your  computer files, it makes it possible for you to share large files and for others to add to those files if permission is given.  After having lunch with Jennifer and Laurel  some of my McKay cousins we decided we needed some way to share what we have with each other and make it available to all the family.  For those of us who technology doesn't come easy this could be a challenge, but if it works it could be a gold mine to share information.

I spent part of my afternoon yesterday scanning materials of my grandfather Ernest R. McKay and his wife Mary Ellen Wilson, those files are now available on my Drop Box.  VERY COOL!

Try This

Last night  after I turned off my light my my mind went into scratched record mode, I even turned the light back on and took care of a couple of things that were bothering me, turned the light off and my mind skipped forward to another scratch.  This is so frustrating to me because no matter what I do, when my mind is in scratched record mode I can't seem to move it to a healthy place.

Tuesday we had book group.  Can I just say I love these women.  We have been together for 7 years now.  We are all very different but we love one another.  We are a Sisterhood.  We trust one another with our concerns, our questions, and our ideas and we have laughed and laughed. Part of our discussion Tuesday was on time and mindfulness.  We mused that being in the moment is really all we have in this earth life.  We can't change the past nor can we worry about what is to come.  My mom use to quote, I don't know who, but we often heard "the best laid plans of mice and men often  go astray."  If we will just live this moment to it's fullest, following the prompting of the Holy Ghost, doing our very best to deal with it, appreciate it, learn from it, if we are mindful, life can be good.

So as I lay in bed last night I thought,"how can I be mindful in this moment?"  I started going thru my five senses.  What was I hearing, tasting, smelling? Were my eyes aware of anything in the dark?  How would I describe what I was touching?  Somewhere in my second go around of each sense I was lost to sleep.

Little Bits of Life

 I had lunch with my cousins Laurel and Jennifer while I was in Logan.  Laurel brought me a surprise.  This is Josh wearing my dad's hat from WWII.

 Sage getting ready for some snow.

 Grandpa and the Higginbothams.  They are looking at pictures of the wicked kitties.

 Michael's birthday, he's our Valentines boy.  Waiting for the new baby we thought it would be fun if he was born on the 12th because it is Lincoln's birthday and he was being named Abe.  When that date passed we had hoped that he might share a birthday with Uncle Michael, but he decided to come on the 17th.

 Sage in Aunt Mel's piggies.

 A "Fancy Nancy" soiree at Aunt Sherrie's.

 Naps for Grandpa.

 Christian ready for Aunt Mel's show,"The Pirates of Penzanze".  It was fabulous.

 Waiting for the curtain.  These kids loved the show.  They know how to be a good audience.

 William and Uncle Michael.

 Stephen and Frank.  Yummy food at Uncle David's.

 Noodles for lunch at Aunt Mel's.

 Number 17 grandchild born February 17th.  Abe Brian Higginbotham.  He is SWEET!

 David meeting Abe.  The hospital won't allow anyone under 14 in the hospital during flu season so the kids had a lunch date with Abe the Babe the day he came home.

 Katie sings a nice lullaby.

Back to Sandpoint.  Breakfast in Dell Montana.  Oh my this is my all time favorite place to eat.

Jack and Wendya

Jack and Wendya were two of my students first semester last year in Tianjin.  They were a delight.  These are their wedding photos.  To be married in China all you do is go to the registrar and pay about $1.50: no ceremony or anything. The bride and groom still look forward to the dressing up, the party and the pictures whether the government approves or not.   

Cherished

This morning I woke up a little later than usual and found Brian with Katie and Sage sitting on top of the heater vent reading books together.  As I watch my children parenting I am so amazed at how well they do.  They are so proactive in their parenting and their children know they are cherished by their parents.  Cherished is defined as "to hold or treat as dear; to care for tenderly; nurture; feel love."

I have a new favorite book.  It was on a display table at our library.  The display was of favorite reads of a few of the librarians.  The book is titled "Stillmeadow Sampler"  by Gladys Taber.  The first edition was published in 1950.  She ambles thru the four seasons on her farm in Connecticut.  It is charming and I love her wisdom.  Here are a couple of paragraphs on children:

Children have problems too as they move from the shallows of childhood to the deep sea of maturity.  I remember overhearing my daughter say to Jill"s daughter, "Now just be patient with them.  You have to be tactful.  After all they're old."  They were about ten at the time, and we did not exactly feel on the shelf.

Now as I see a new bevy of school children waithing for the school bus, I wonder what changes the world will bring to them.  But I hope for them them that they may have a backlog of family love.  A child that is confident that he or she is cherished is armed against almost anything life can bring.


Gladys Taber delights me with her views on dieting, T.V. , fear, storms, spinach, reading, manners, New Year's Resolutions, collections and scheduling and the list goes on.  This definitely a book that I will need to purchase.  There is simply too much that needs underlining and reread.  I found myself chuckling often and needing to share the tidbits of wisdom with Jessica as she patiently sits on the couch willing this baby to grow inside her a little longer.

Life in Logan

I flew into Logan on Friday to lend a hand while we wait for Baby Higginbotham.  Micheal picked me up from the airport and it was nice to visit on the ride up.  This little guy is giving Jessica a run for her money.  Jessica likes the name Abe and Sage called him Abe the Babe because it rhymes.  The other choice is Benjamin Brian.  Dad continues to hold down the fort and take care of the kitties.

Double Humph!

I erased my entire external hard drive this morning.  How you say?  Who knows.  I am trying a recovery program as I write.    It has all our China pictures, China journals, my family history work, art files etc.  Dad was calm as ever.  He did say it was sad that  since we are both slowly losing our minds it had been nice to know our memories were stored someplace where they could be retrieved.  Hope the recovery works.  If not maybe the angels in heaven have records.

Humph!!

Disappointing dinners two nights in a row.  I am probably more sad than I normally would have been but for the fact I was so looking forward to both.  Last night was ham and white bean soup, one of my favorites.  Totally blah!  The ham hock I purchased had about two slivers of ham on it and it just didn't cut the mustard, really no flavor in the beans or the broth. Tonight was chicken roll-ups.  I haven't made those forever and was thinking how yummy they would be.  One small problem.  A friend gave me a jar of home canned chicken that wasn't really it chicken.  What was it??? Fish!  Fish just doesn't do it for me when my brain had wrapped itself around chicken.  I felt like Mrs. Snow in Pollyanna,"but I had my heart set on...".  To top it off my chocolate chip cookies were a muddy mess running all over the pan.  I hope my kitchen is friendlier next week.

No Thanks

Today I am grateful for a husband who has learned to say "no" to himself.  Over the years he has said "no" to extravagant purchases, to "I like to see what this is like just once" to selfish indulgences and the list goes on. Last night I spent the evening taking care of a friends children while she went to an addiction class with her husband.  Her husband is a man with tremendous talent and ability but because of his wanting to try pornography just once to see what it was all about he has struggled with a 15 year addiction that has lost him jobs, self respect and possibly his family.  It has led to anger issues and possible abuse.  I hope their family survives and flourishes in time.  I am oh so grateful to Nelson who says"no, not interested, that's not for me, no thanks".

Math

One of these days I will get back to posting pictures.  For some reason the smart phone has redirected my picture taking and I can't quite get them on the computer.  Not that I don't know how I just don't.   I think that is why I have not blogged, guilt for no pictures.  Hopefully I will do better this year.  I like the blogging it is a good journaling outlet about some of the small and simple things that seem to fill life with real memories.

So why is this post labeled 'Math"?  Math seems to be filling a great part of each day at the farm.  Michael is preparing for the GRE and he and Nelson study math  almost every morning for an hour to an hour and a half. We also start our first semester of math with our Pathway mission next week.  Our first assignment is to have our math facts memorized in addition/subtraction 1-15 and our multiplication facts from 1-15.

Back in my day fifth grade was the year your memorized you multiplication tables.  Timed tests were given everyday and after a week or so if you didn't pass the timed test you started to miss recess.  I missed a lot of recess and still don't remember some of my facts.  When I saw the word memorize and timed test for this first class my mind went into panic mode. Well last night I took the two TIMED tests that our student will take on Thursday. Scary, I noticed my stomach was in a knot and I was nervous.  I had to remind myself.  I would not miss recess if I did not finish the tests in the allotted time, nor was my worth as a human being being judged on how quickly I can take a timed test. Nelson reminds me that on a ship it is the compass not the clock that is most important.  That doesn't seem to be the case in school, even at the university level.  But this is not meant to be a soapbox on our educational system.

Over the years I have allowed myself to develop a mental block against memorizing.  I just haven't been able to find a system that works for me.  Over the last few months I have read a couple of books on memorizing. For names the methods work pretty good but not so for my multiplication facts.  So going to one of my favorite haunts (the library)  I checked out a mental math program.  Fabulous!!!  Instead of memorizing my math facts they gave me some nifty tricks.  Instead of a whole slew of multiplication facts I just have to remember the trick.  Fabulous!!!!!!!!  I find myself laying in bed giving my self multiplication problems to figure out in my head.  Sick I know.  But I have developed a whole new level of confidence to ask questions and not care that it's a question instead of an answer.    While David and Sherrie were here I had David try to explain probability to me.  I don't have the whole concept down, but I understand the first part of the equation.  David was a patient teacher. A 59 year old should already know this stuff.  But hey, it's the compass not the clock that is most important on a ship, right?