The Nitty Gritty

Hi family! How was your February? Ours was busy! I was sustained in church last week as Primary President, I have two job interviews this coming week, and I hosted book club Friday night so I feel like everything is kind of happening at once. Plus, I'm in charge of the classroom supply drive for the teachers in March and that has been way more time consuming than I thought. I'll be glad when it's over! Isaac won a cooking contest last night! His colleagues planned a dinner party based on the Food Network show "Chopped." They delivered ingredients to our house and we had to make up a dish with it. They brought us pork chops, apple cider vinegar, porcini mushrooms, Himalayan salt, and pistachios. Isaac found this awesome Rachael Ray recipe. One of the judges that our friends asked to come judge is a chef at Powell Gardens and he told Isaac it was the best pork chop he's ever had. I haven't had meat in 4 months, but I ended up eating a bite of Isaac's...

Hi family, It snowed today. We came home from church and I quickly changed into Isaac's Chewbacca suit. I took a fat nap, always awesome. Today was the eighth anniversary of my dad, Grandpa Garrett's, death. Time definitely heals the pain of grief. I'm grateful for his legacy and that he is in a better place. It seems I've reached this weird phase in my life. I find myself asking, "Now what?" I like subbing and the flexibility it offers. I also like the idea of going back to full time teaching and living on a double salary income. I did submit an application to the Warrensburg school district. I figure it doesn't hurt to apply. Come March, there will be posted openings and if I do get asked to interview and then was offered a job, I can make a decision. I have learned a few things about myself this past year in regards to working: I can't work from home. It doesn't do my mental health any good. I need to be out of my house interacting with peop...

Hey family! This week was awesome! I got to sub 4 days and on my day off I met with my friend to discuss upcoming PTO stuff. Her husband is getting deployed for six months. I just don't know how these military parents do it. That would be so hard. Our schools have counseling groups for kids whose parents are in deployment. Isaac went to a MMEA (Missouri Music Educators Association) Conference this week. He left Wednesday and came home Saturday. He did a poster session where he displayed a poster about his dissertation. Copies of his dissertation arrived in the mail. I started reading his novella today. I'm so proud of Isaac and all the work and research he accomplished the past 4 years. If you ever want to read his dissertation or just the novella, let us know! We're trying to figure out how to publish it because several people have expressed interest in reading it. The weather was amazing this weekend. The boys and I played baseball on the driveway. Yesterday Isaac c...

Happy New Year! We had a great trip to Utah. We met our newest nephew, Myles Lamont, son of Mitch and Supriya. We also got to see their new house in Clearfield. We got to spend time with family and saw lots of old friends at Isaac's graduation party. Our trip ended on a stressful note. Our CRV had to get repaired, the repairs were very costly so we decided to trade it in and upgrade to a mini van. It's a 2008 Honda Odyssey. We really love it and have wanted a van for a long time. I guess it's good that we were forced (maybe strongly encouraged) into getting one. It's the first time in our 14 years of marriage that we have a car payment! Ugh! Cars=necessary evils. Also, we brought Heidi, the dog, home with us. It was something we were really looking forward to, but discovered that we are not dog owners and it's an added stress we don't need/want in our lives. She is the sweetest dog and so well behaved. She sat in the back seat the entire drive. Once she was hom...

Tomorrow is Christmas! We woke up this morning to SNOW. The boys, particularly William, were beside themselves. Will has been really wanting it to snow here so it felt magical when we saw our first snow on Christmas Eve. We went to church for just Sacrament meeting today. The boys sang with the primary children and Isaac and I sang in the ward choir. After church we played games, played in the snow (just the boys), baked goodies, and Isaac baked baguettes. We delivered goodies to friends and were able to visit with some of them. Then we came back home and ate soup with Isaac's bread, baked chocolate chip cookies for Santa and sang "All the Friendly Beasts" by Sufjan Stevens. We finished the night reading Luke Chapter 2 and now the boys are trying to falling asleep as I'm typing this. I was able to help with the holiday parties for Will and Van's classes. Van's class had their party first thing in the morning. The kids were so calm because they didn't h...

Good morning! What a week! Isaac graduated on Monday!! The boys and I popped some popcorn and watched the video of the graduation on the ASU website. There are some great close up shots of Isaac and Dr. Stauffer. When Isaac received his diploma we cheered and jumped up and down. It was very exciting.   Isaac's parents were able to be there for the ceremonies. On Wednesday, the boys and I went to pick up Isaac at the airport. When we were almost there, Isaac called and said his flight was delayed by two and a half hours. So I took the boys to the Harry S. Truman Library and the Liberty Jail site. We also stopped at McDonald's for lunch.  This is where Harry S. Truman and his wife lived when they weren't living in the White House. I had no idea his presidential library was in Independence until I noticed the signs. It was very fascinating to see the different displays and read about his presidency. William was very disturbed during the exhibit of the...

Isaac is graduating tomorrow!!!! Yipee skipee, hallelujah, thank the heavens, woo hoo, yahoo, praise the Lord, YES!! His parents are going to be there to cheer him on! I posted this story on Facebook and wanted to put it on my blog too. 5 years ago this coming summer, Isaac started his PhD program at ASU in Tempe, AZ. We tried to fit as much as we could in our UHaul, but had to forgo some items, like our Christmas tree. We bought a great condo close to the ASU campus, but it was much smaller than our home in Utah. I purchased a tiny artificial tree at Family Dollar and named it our "PhD Tree". Initially, we planned on lsaac completing his doctorate in three years. Last Christmas was his 4th year in the program. One night, our friends the Heders were over visiting and our tiny, white tree came crashing down to the ground. I yelped and then laughed. I cried out, "It's a sign! This has to be our LAST Christmas in this condo!" Sure enough, two months later, I...