MaeLyn's Musings

It's funny what a difference a month can make. A little over a month ago, I would walk my boys to school and return home to a quiet house for the next seven hours, and I would find things to do to keep myself busy for most of the day, and not really think anything of it. This morning around 9:45, friends came to pick up Josh and Peter and took them to their house to play for the day. At 11:15, Hannah and John were picked up to go to the church for Youth Conference, which will continue the rest of today, and most of tomorrow. Steven is at work. I have the house to myself for the next six hours, and already I'm scratching my head. What do I want to do today? The last couple days the kids and I have played with LEGOs. We've watched movies and played Life and Monopoly and Rack-o and Pit. Yesterday I took the boys to the pool. So what can I do when I don't have anyone else around? Do I start a new project? Do I have an old project around somewhere I can finish? Do I have...

Last night for their Mutual activity, the young men and young women in our ward went to the park near our house to go ice blocking. Hannah and John walked down lugging the ice sleds they made in our freezer along with some old towels. Shortly after they left, I received a series of texts from Steven, who had followed them down: The sprinklers are on at the park! They may have to wait a bit... Oops. Nope, kids going down in the sprinklers anyway. First two down the hill - Hannah and John. Sounds like fun. Just a warning, two kids are going to be completely soaked by the time they come home. Do I need to bring down some towels? They can walk home wet. Whether they will be allowed to come inside is a different matter... We could hose them down if they're muddy. Sounds like fun. Are other kids ice blocking in the sprinklers too? Everyone, yeah. You didn't bring the camera did you? Just the camera on the phone. The sprinklers have stopped now. They got home s...

Tuesday felt like a busy day. As usual, Steven got up and was on his way to work before 7am.  Around 8:15, two cars pulled up in front of our house. The four kids climbed into one to  a friend's house to play. I climbed into the other and went to join some of the Relief Society sisters in a trip to the Denver temple. We arrived at the temple by 9:30, and attended a 10:00 session. Afterwards I joined some of the sisters for lunch at Cafe Rio, and enjoyed the time  with friends. I didn't get home after 2:30pm, and the kids were still at their friend's house. Enjoying the quiet, I made hoagie rolls for dinner, and did some other chores around the house, but I had a headache and didn't feel like doing a lot. Steven and the kids returned home within ten minutes of each other, around 6pm. We had hoagie sandwiches for dinner, then set off to go to a cub scout pack meeting. Our summer cub scout attendance is very, very low. There were only about four or five families at the...

In the Doctor Who TV series, there is an alien race called the silence. According to the show, they have lived here on earth since the dawn of time. However, the silence have a strange defense mechanism - as soon as a person looks away from them, he forgets the silent's very existence. The silence use post-hypnotic suggestion to manipulate people to do what they want them to do. A few minutes ago, the boys climbed into a car and drove away to spend the rest of the afternoon playing at a friend's house. Hannah was in her room, and the house was silent. For a moment, it reminded me of what it was like when school was in session, when all the kids were at school and I had several hours of silence during which I could think, and blog about what I was thinking of. It reminded me of someone seeing one of the Doctor Who Silents for the second time and saying, "Oh yeah! I remember you! How on earth could I have forgotten you?" Except that my re-encounter with peaceful sil...

The kids with the friends who helped make the cupcakes. (Steven is working on the pizzas in the background.) Yesterday was Peter's birthday. He still wasn't feeling the greatest, and so he spent most of the day lying around watching movies and playing a few games. Hannah and Josh went to a friend's house for the afternoon, where they made monkey cupcakes for Peter. Steven made pizza for the birthday dinner. It was great, but poor Peter only managed to eat a little less than one slice. His cupcakes are still waiting for him. After dinner, Peter went on a treasure hunt to find all his gifts, and then opened them. He received a red duct tape fez, a yellow boomerang (a bananarang... which later got lost on a neighbor's roof), a pool noodle (or "poodle"), some origami creations, some gummi bananas, a book (Diary of a Wimpy Kid 8), a movie (Frozen) and a couple games (Rack-o and Pit). When the gifts were opened, some of the kids went outside to play with the...

You know how I mentioned yesterday that Peter took a nap on the living room couch at 10am yesterday? Did it sound strange to you that my active almost nine year old would take a morning nap? Well if so, you're right. He spent the rest of the day either laying there on the couch with a headache, or else in the bathroom throwing up. (I'm so glad that he is old enough to get to the bathroom when he needs to throw up!) He sipped from a water bottle throughout the day and watched movies from the couch. He had a fever that got up to 103*F last night, and he went to bed early instead of attending cub scouts. This morning his temperature was back down to 99*F, but he has already thrown up once so far today. (It couldn't have been much because he hardly ate anything yesterday.) I convinced him to eat a bite of toast and drink a cup of milk for breakfast before going back to bed and he was busily snoring away last time I checked on him. The sad thing is that he seems to take it a...

Yesterday morning, I received a call from a brother from church. He told me that his two children who were visiting from college or wherever they are now had come home and had cleaned out the piles of junk in his basement and storage room, and that he was going to give a whole bunch of stuff to the local ARC, but if we wanted, we could come over that evening and look through it, and we could have anything we wanted. I'm always a fan of free stuff, so last night Steven and I drove over to his house, where he was out in his garage dismantling a TV stand. Half of his two car garage was full of boxes and bags. There was a huge television, stuffed animals, baskets, dishes, videos, games, decorations, water bottles, about a five-lifetime supply of toothpicks, three Christmas trees, enough decorations for five Christmas trees, and enough lights for at least three houses. Steven and I picked through it, and eventually brought home two games: Monopoly (Deluxe Edition) and Life, one Christ...