Fire station

The guy LOVES trucks, but especially trash trucks and fire trucks. We visited the fire station around the corner TWICE and he still loves it.

During the second visit he brought his own fire truck to we could compare. 

I adore the noise he makes when he talks about fire trucks. "Weee oooo weee oooo"

He didn't love the ambulance when I told him that people sit in there when they get hurt. He was very serious about the hurt people. 

Farmer Ondricek

The guy loves animals. We have visited a local farm twice in the last week; first just me and him, then with our new neighbors and friends. (We absolutely LOVE our new neighbors too! Friendly mom and dad, four sweet children for the guy to play with. They brought us homemade muffins last night and we love them. Neighbors don't get better then this family.)

Anyway, back to our farm adventure. It was a blast, especially with friends!

We must have scared the peacock. It was gorgeous, though.

He may have liked the tractors more than anything else.

Sorry this is so blurry, but it's the only one I got of the cow milking. I loved it so much more than the guy.

While I gawked over the milkings, he could not get over watching the tractors. 

(What the guy was looking at)

Did I mentioned he LOVED all the tractors?

 

Such stinking cute kids.

Last but not least, the pigs. They had babies a few months ago and just a week ago. Too cute to eat. Yet. We saw the pigs more than any other animal. The guy loves pigs.

Why does he love pigs so much? It has something to do with this eraser pig that he treasures and plays with almost every day. 

I'm so grateful we can see these animals for free and see them often. I want his learning to be as hands-on as possible. 

genes and drives

It's Saturday morning. Jared wakes up late and hurries to get ready for class. He will be gone all day.

I scrambled to put on some clothes, use the bathroom, pack Jared a lunch, and put S in the car in his pajamas. We enjoy some apple and banana on the way to drop Jared off. I enjoy the drive time as a family. The joys I wouldn't get if Jared and I had separate cars....

After saying a pray with them in the car, kissing my sweet husband goodbye, and pulling out of the parking lot, I turned on the book I've been listening to.

I am listening to a book on CD, so my drives are still anticipated even when I am alone. The fictional book is called, Still Alice  and it's about a brilliant Harvard psychology professor who is diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease at age 50. While 'the guy' looks out the back window and chats to himself, I listen to Alice's thoughts and reactions after the diagnosis is confirmed with genetic testing. Mutated genes give her three children a 50% chance of getting the disease. She forgets recipes she's been making since childhood. She forgets to catch her plane to Chicago. She reintroduces herself to an acquiescence she met only moments before. When will she stop recognizing her children and husband? When will she start wandering the halls at night? When will she completely forget how to get home safely when she goes for her daily jog? These and so many more questions begin to haunt her and her family.

I look in the rear view mirror at my little boy. My only son, my first born. My flesh and blood. My genes. My husband's genes. With all our genetic beauties and failures. Jared's mom and grandma both died too young from cancer, and I have a great fear that Jared is predisposed to the disease as well. We have changed many lifestyle choices to make the odds more in our favor. We control what we can control. The guy locks eyes with mine. He is sucking his thumb, still waking up, and holding the corner of his blanket. His favorite blanket that grandma O made him. He adores this blanket.

My thoughts tune back to Alice. She plays with the idea of her children and husband one day letting something as insignificant and treatable as pneumonia taking her life to stop the mutual suffering. She thinks she would rather have been diagnosed with cancer.

It hits me. I miss Mom O. I miss her with an ache I can't push down. I begin to cry in the car somewhere along route 28 and weep for several minutes. My son deserves to know his grandma and I miss talking to my mother-in-law. There is so much she hasn't told me yet. So much yet to learn. But in this melancholy moment, I thank God that she was taken quickly and with her mind in tact. She suffered for less than a year and loved her family and friends til the very end. Even her funeral brought glory to God and comforting friendship to her family. There is always a silver lining. But I still miss her. I need to make a story book of her life adventures so my children will know of their amazing heritage. I will make that book for them. I must. Soon.

Snack Pack Service Project

 My calling at church right now is Relief Society Activities Coordinator. Unlike many other wards, this one does not have a committee. It is just me, the second counselor in the Relief Society, who supervises activities, and a food coordinator. Together with these two outstanding women, we organized a service project just one month after each us were new in our respective callings. My previous ward had done this service for our public school district, so in the interest of time and resources, we did the same thing in my new ward. 

We asked the ladies at church to volunteer (using SignUp Genius) to supply the non-perishable foods needed to make 100 "snack packs" for the kids in our county. Snack packs are bags filled with foods that could constitute meals for kids between lunch on Friday and breakfast on Monday. These snack packs are offered to kids who qualify for free and reduced lunch and who have no guarantee of meals at home on the weekend. The snack packs are certainly not gourmet. They have to be non-perishable and simple, so that kids can prepare and eat them even if they are home alone, as many are. Our goal of 100 was a lofty one, but the sisters at church really pulled through. We had extras in some categories and so we made the goal and then donated the rest to the school district anyway. Thank you ladies!!

What a beautiful sight!

The other service we provided was help the Youth Conference planner make up bouquets for the dance competition later this summer. We also enjoyed a chicken tortilla soup dinner and desserts together. Delish! With both activities and lovingly prepared foods, I think it was a great success! 

The following day, I received this email update and almost cried thinking of those students we are trying to help. I am going to look into it more and learn what else can be done to help them this summer.

"Hi gals,
[We] dropped off our snack packs at the District Office this morning. They were shocked and grateful about the number of items we collected. [Fiona], the homeless liaison, said that the packs would be very helpful this summer to 55 particular students. 55 students in the district are homeless and these will help feed them over the summer. A few students in this group of 55 homeless students have been accepted to colleges on scholarships where the colleges will provide their meals but through the summer they don't have much access to food.
The pile of packs was stacked on [Fiona]'s desk and different district employees were excitedly taking pictures. They asked for our contact information to followup with a thank you note."

What ideas do you have to help these students who go hungry over the weekend or summer?

what we've been up to

After-nap snack

Delicious grape sculptures and barbells

Painting once again, this time out in the glorious sun on the deck

Learning about colors

Love that smile - he looks like a cooky, old man missing some teeth. Well, he is missing teeth still. :)

Camping with ticks

For Memorial day we decided to go camping at a near by state park. We hadn't gone for years, our son had never been, we have all this cool gear, there was a strawberry festival at the park, we think we're tough.... for all these good reasons we thought it was a great idea. Hmph. 

Lessons learned (or maybe just reminders): 

There are good reasons we haven't gone in years

Gear is not a good enough reason

We needed better gear for that hike

We won't enjoy a festival after a terrible night camping

We are not that tough

Ticks and worry take all the fun out of sitting in the grass

Not all ticks give you Lyme Disease

Allergies are worse in the woods

I hate bugs

Pregnant women still have to pee a lot, even if they are in the woods

Fires don't burn well with wet wood

We prefer air conditioning over muggy heat

First we had to walk 1.06 miles to get from the car to the camp site. We were unprepared for the "trail" since we had not been there before.

Jared is superman and pushed all our crap (and sometimes the guy too) on these very uncooperative wheels through a huge meadow, over rocks, and up a gravel road.

This is how NOT to avoid ticks getting all over your child

The guy was such a good sport and walked a long way for those little legs. Over an hour later, we arrived at the camp site. By then we had already pulled 2 ticks off of the little guy. 

This eagle scout made the most of the water-filled fire pit. He laid as many flat rocks as he could on the bottom to build the fire on. It had been raining for days prior to our trip and we were forbidden by law to bring our own wood in to the park. Only the wet scraps remained. Consequently, we enjoyed lots of smoke, which did get rid of the pests flying around our faces. :)

Using the battery-powered air pump we brought for the air mattress to wake up the fire.  Jared nearly passed  out trying to blow on the fire. Then we used this! Genius!

An hour later the fire was hot and strong enough to heat the hot dogs. That was all. We had brought delicious tin foil pockets of veggies and herbs, and a fruity dessert but the fire wasn't hot enough to cook them. At least we didn't go hungry. 

Admiring my hero from afar

The sun had done down, it was all dark, and the camera flash nearly blinded me and the guy. We don't normally look so wide-eyed and bushy tailed. :) 

Breakfast. By 6:30 am we had had enough and were ready to just go home. I woke up so much in the night, each time to nightmares of ticks eating my family alive, painful legs cramps, or pee attacks. However the ticks had paralyzed me with with fear to leave the tent. On one such pee trip I found a tick in my pants along the waist line. We found 3 more in the tent before packing up - one below the mattress, one in the guy's port-a-crib, and one in our blanket! Oh, not to mention the one that had attached to the guy's little butt. 

The natural beauty was my favorite part - a highlight a midst many dark stressors. 

We found this treasure the next morning on our hike back to the car.  S must have dropped it the day before.  I bet some lonesome tick found shelter in it over night. 

When we arrived at home we all showered and checked for more ticks. I had one stubborn tick on my back that just would not come out smoothly. Jared eventually saved me and we are all fine. However, we did learn a lot about the proper way to I.D and remove ticks. My sister contracted Lyme Disease from a tick in childhood and I am very paranoid. But, we are good now.

Our take home message from what I fear has come off as a very negative post: The Ondricek family prefers day hikes to overnight camping. We love the scenic views, the non-flesh eating creatures, and the physical activity as long as we can go home, shower, and sleep comfortably in our own beds. Now we know. And so do you. :) 

Any lessons you've learned that make for a fun family camp trip?