Thankful for the Legacy...

I am blessed to have some amazingly brave ancestors, and they have been on my mind a lot lately. I've always wondered how they did it - giving up home, friends and family to move across the world or across the country. Leaving everything behind to do what they knew to be right. Standing up for their religious convictions in the face of hatred and fear. I've always wondered if I would have had the courage to do what they did. I'm not sure.

I've had to do a lot of brave things lately, and let me tell you that it is very hard. When my son was struggling with the gender change of his music teacher, I had to pull him out of class. I've been accused of discrimination, been called a bigot, and many friendships have been lost or altered. Teachers that I once worked side by side with have held me up as an example of how not to be a parent. I have been labled as intolerant for standing up for my children. I've chosen not to publicly fight them. Defending my position would mean laying Adam's pain open for the world to see, and I won't do that. And now we are nearing the end of our fight to pass Prop 8. It's been a difficult journey for me as I have people that I dearly love in a committed same-sex relationship. But again, I feel to stand up for children - mine and others - and for my religion - which I am deeply committed to - and say that marriage should be between a man and a woman for the purpose of having children and raising them to love and worship God. My dear son Matthew, not knowing that I was too chicken to volunteer, told his friend's mom that our family would be happy to stand on the street corner and wave Prop 8 signs. How could I admit to him how cowardly I was? So... I went. More sneers, more name calling, and lots of little birds flipping around. But, I did it! I survived! Maybe I could have been a pioneer. I'm thankful today for them, for their courage, and for a little bit of something they had that still lives on in me.

Friends

It's Thursday, and I've been thinking all day today about how thankful I am for my friends. So, here's to Karen, who drove my carpool after Robotics today and offered to let Adam hang out there until I got home from Matt's game. . . to Alicia, my fellow soccer mom who keeps me company at all those games. . . to those PTA gals, who are an example to me of tireless service, and to Marlina, who stepped up and offered to take all the high school kids to In-and-Out Burger for lunch tomorrow because they have a minimum day. These friends and many others bless my life every day, and I feel so lucky to have them in my life!

The Story of Soccer

I love having kids that are busy doing something, so when the Robotics teacher at the high school told me that he signed Matthew up for his class, I thought it was great! But then Matthew came home from school on the first day and said, and I quote, "Mom - they're all nerds and they're happy about it!" So, since aligning yourself with the nerds is one of the seven deadly sins of high school, I let him drop the class - on the condition that he find something else to do. So, he tried out for the soccer team. You must know that Matthew quit playing soccer somewhere around the 5th grade, and there aren't any freshman sports at our high school, so he was going to have to try out for the JV team. Would he make it? NO - he didn't make the JV team because there wasn't a JV team - so he's on the Varsity soccer team. What??? Anyway, it's been so much fun! He's learned and grown so much, and I'm really proud of him. The coach has been wonderful and lets him play part of every game - sometimes even 20-30 minutes. Today was their last home game (they won!) and even though I'm going to be glad to have one less thing on the schedule, I'm going to miss this!

Rebuilding the Wonder

Shortly after we moved to Vacaville, volunteers from throughout the city gathered to build a fabulous wooden playground called "Great Wonders" in Andrews Park. When the kids were little they loved coming to this playgound and would play for hours if I let them. After all these years the playground was beginning to show its age, so over the course of the past week the community gathered again to rebuild it. I had participated in the build as a part of our Young Women's activity, and when I saw in the paper on Saturday morning that they really needed more volunteers, I convinced Brad that we should take the kids and go work for a few hours. It seemed like it was the least we could do to pay back the many hours of enjoyment it has provided us.

We worked really hard. We spent the first couple of hours shoveling and moving rock. Then we spent the next hour digging up the rock so we could lay down the piping for the telephone feature. By the time we were done the boys were absolutely exhausted, but I could have stayed all day. It was so fun to feel like you were contributing to something that would bring joy to so many.

Can you see Brad? He's crouched over in the middle of the picture in a white shirt - trying to get the piping just right. What a stud!

I helped set these posts that will form the perimeter fence. Didn't I do a great job?

Camille wasn't actually old enough to be on the job site, so she had to go to the little day care center where they had pizza, snacks, Spongebob cartoons, an abundance of craft projects, and a darling clown. Needless to say, she had a GREAT time (and the boys were very jealous!).

They were supposed to finish the new park today (Sunday). We promised the kids that if it was finished we'd go spend FHE there tomorrow. Can't wait to see how it turns out!

I'm thankful for you, sweetie!

In honor of Brad's birthday, I devote Thankful Thursday to him. What a great guy. I'm sure it won't come as a surprise to most of you, but I can be difficult to live with. This great guy loves me anyways! (Well, most of the time anyway!) He is patient, kind, loyal, and a great blessing in my life. He teaches me, inspires me, and sometimes even serves me. (How's that for a treat!) I'm thankful to have him and thankful for all the ways he's helped me grow over these many years. You're the best, Brad. Happy Birthday!

We enjoyed a lovely day together. He came home early from work to enjoy Matt's soccer game with me, we took the kids out to dinner (a very rare treat these days!), my parents stopped by, several loved ones called, and some lovely friends stopped by for a chat. And, at the age of *%#!, he finally got his own MP3 player. We usually say that Matthew looks like Brad, but today Brad looks like Matthew!

Why is it?

Why is it that there always seems to be an inverse relationship between the amount of time you spend preparing FHE and the successfulness of said FHE. I went all out on the lesson this week. I made the kids conference packets that were individually tailored to them so that they could take notes. On Monday night they could use their notes to answer questions about the sessions and win candy. And... if they couldn't answer the question they could "ask a friend" and both win a piece of candy. Isn't any FHE that involves candy supposed to be successful? Apparently not!

They fought the entire night...
He always gets the easy questions! That question is entirely unfair! I don't want her help because then she'll have more candy than me! The list goes on....
and on....
and on!

My intentions were good-


They started off happy enough -



Where did it all go so wrong??? Please tell me this happens to someone else besides me!

Motherhood

Today I got offered a job. There's a second grade class at our school that needs a teacher until at least January and probably until June. As those actors and actresses always say, it was so flattering "just to be nominated" (or asked, as the case may be). Me? You'd like ME to do it? The ideas started swimming around in my head. . . I'm of worth, people value my skills, they like me! And the money would be nice. We could loosen our belts a bit, finally get some new carpet, or better yet - some beautiful granite countertops to replace the worn, cracked tile in the kitchen. And then reality sets in. . . staff meetings, grading papers, report cards, parent conferences. The list goes on an on. It's not that I mind hard work, but when would I be a mom? I'm going to have to tell them no. The honest truth is that I'm just not ready to give up day to day motherhood. . . volunteering in the kids' classrooms, going on field trips, serving on the PTA, a quiet morning of laundry and pulling weeds, running endless errands, going to soccer games, driving the high school carpool. The list goes on and on. I love that I still have a few more years to do those things for my kids that I sometimes forget are the great blessings in my life. Time goes by so fast. I don't want to miss a single minute. It's going to end sooner than I'd like already. I love being a mom, and I'm going to go on doing it. Today I'm thankful for the chance I have to be a stay-at-home mom.