Scorching the World

1/30     Tom left about 9am for the Bay Area. He took Sarah with him, so I had a very quiet day. I mostly worked on stuff in my room. When I did leave, for a piano lesson and some shopping, I saw that it was an absolutely beautiful day today! I tried to coax the kids outside, but nobody was interested. So pretty, warm, and sunny! I am now taking piano lessons. I thought since I've been teaching piano for a year, I maybe since I never have, I should take lessons so I know what I'm talking about. My lessons are on Tuesdays and it's really fun. I learned a better way of practicing; now I can't wait to practice to see how effective it is.

1/29     Tom frequently wakes up around 4 or 5 am. Most times he comes back to bed by 6:30 or so, but this morning he didn't come back. I got up, got dressed and eventually went out to start some laundry when I saw why he never came back. Trina had spent the night in Los Angeles with Chris, so she wasn't there when Ziona woke up, so when she came out to the family room she cuddled up with her grandpa! I could see he was in 7th heaven and would never leave that spot as long as she was next to him. She was watching tv and he was napping off and on. So cute! I wish I had taken a picture. Tom had planned to work from home today, but a phone call changed all that and he had to go to the Bay Area. He called in the late afternoon and said that Sarah had called and said she was putting herself in rehab but needed a place where she could stay clean for a few days. He was so elated that she is making that step that he gladly said she could come, as long as I was ok with it. I sur...

1/28/18    Mila had her first gymnastics meet today in Salida, which is only 1 ½ hours from here. Unfortunately it was during our Regional Conference broadcast. I hated to miss it, but we felt we needed to support our daughter and granddaughter. Caeli went with us because she is special friends with Mila and because she also does gymnastics so she can appreciate how good they are. We left about the same time Trina and family left for Conference. I took the game SEEK to play in the car on the way, which helped it feel more like Sunday. Mila did really good.    She did really well. On the uneven bars, she flubbed on both warm-up tries and was getting mad or sad, but her coach talked to her and got her smiling again and on her actual performance did really well, coming in 2 nd place!  The beam is the one that makes me the most nervous, but she did good! You can hardly see her run the vault. It's on the far side of the room and she...

1/27        Yesterday I finished putting tiles where contact paper had been on all the shelves of the peninsula and the pantry. It was super hard and took hours, but looks so much better. Of course to do that I had to take everything off of the shelves to do the tiles, then sort it as I put it back. It was fun because I found things that were lost and that I  had forgotten we had! Today Tom left very early to go with our youth to do baptisms for the dead. I was glad to sleep in, but felt guilty for not going with him. That’s the shift at the temple that we used to work so many years ago and he said everyone there asked about me and encouraged us to come back to work that shift again. Early Saturday morning was extremely painful for me every single week, so I don’t think so. After the baptisms, he took advantage of being there to do some initiatories whose names we are working on so they’re ready for endowments and sealings. Hooray! Righ...

1/25       Tom got to stay home all day today. So nice! I love having him home. Some women complain that their husbands drive them crazy after they retire, but I think I’m really going to like it. So in the morning Tom, Trina and I went to Laurel Lawrence’s class. She is focusing the next several weeks on biographies of the 12 apostles of Jesus’ time. Today was on Peter. I love Peter. I had a dream about him when I was on my first mission and ever since then, I’ve felt like I knew him; like he’s a friend of mine and I love him. The class was good and I will put my notes on my other blog. At 2pm I needed to pick up Caeli to give her a ride home from school. A few days ago I bought some vinyl floor tiles, the cheap adhesive kind, to use as shelf liners in my kitchen. When we moved in, I spent a small fortune on good contact paper to line all my shelves, but it just wouldn’t ever stick. I put in thumb tacks to hold it down, but it still curls up and l...

1/24/18    The Relief Societies are in charge of feeding missionaries at zone conferences. Our stake is in charge 4 times a year and other stakes rotate with us on all the other zone conferences. Before we got put in as stake RS presidency, the wards were expected to help provide food and serve but when we got the calling, we decided the ward RS presidents already are way too busy, so we told them they didn’t need to worry about it anymore. So the 4 of us prepare and serve. Today we got there an hour before time to feed them. Three of us took precooked, hot lasagna, one sister made a huge salad, and we each took desserts. It took very little time to set up some serving tables and get the food ready, so we just chatted until the missionaries were sent to eat. I love serving and getting to chat with each of them. Actually, there was no time to chat and almost EVERY.SINGLE.ONE said “Thank you so much.” They’re so cute. The only problem was that we ran out of food. The las...

1/22     We get so many pleasant memories while having Trina and family here. One thing I adore is how almost daily, we will see Trevor walking around carrying a can that has it's label removed. He loves black beans in a tortilla. The problem is he is still too small to make the can opener work. So he carries around the can until he can find someone to open it and put the beans in a pan for him. So cute! Tom was able to work from home today. That was the good news. The bad news was that one of his marketers suddenly told them he had jury duty today, so Tom spent all day calling people to try to get appointments for the techs. All day. I felt so bad for him. I would totally and completely hate having to make telephone sales calls all day! I worked on various things; nothing earth shattering. In the evening we were scheduled to go to FHE in Fresno, but Tom forgot and before time to leave, took a leisurely shower and got dressed in his pajamas. When I reminded him, he ha...

1/21                  I do love Sundays. It’s so nice to not have to think about regular stuff like cleaning, cooking, working, etc. Tom and I got up at 6am – Oh first I have to tell what happened earlier. About 3:45am, Tom woke up too hot. Well, when we went to bed, I remembered that I hadn’t turned down the heat. I was already very comfortable and cozy, so Tom went. I usually do all things thermostat because he says he doesn’t know how. But this time, I told him what to do and we went to bed. Then at 3:45 he woke up and said it was too hot. He got up to check the thermostat. It was set at 66 but it was 72 in our room. I said just open the door so the air can circulate, but he kept asking me questions and said he was wide awake, so he went to watch tv for a little while. By then I was wide awake, but I don’t like to watch tv when I’m tired. I went back to bed and tried to go back to sleep, but to no avail. By 6:00 am, I was really mad...

1/20/18    Tom and I went this morning to the church where he cleaned and I practiced. I love playing the organ. It makes me happy to be able to play some of the hymns and hear the rich tones and harmonies. We worked on various things during the day and I had just started cleaning the stovetop when it was time to get ready to go to the baptism. It’ so nice to have great missionaries here who are working so hard. The baptism started on time, the talks were short and good, the baptism was special, and best of all, the sister had a whole bunch of her family there – kids and grandkids. So the room was almost half full of just her family. We also had a great turnout from the ward. Even the Mission President and his wife were there! That was special! They have a daughter that is leaving soon for her mission in Vina Del Mar Chile! So we had things to talk about! I was asked to lead the music. When the missionaries asked me to lead the music, I considered asking what t...

1/18        Thursday s I go to Laurel Lawrence’s classes. They are always really good. She talks really fast and I write as much as I can as fast as I can, but I know I miss a lot, and since I’m writing the last thing she said, I won’t remember it at all. But still, what I do get is always super good stuff. In the past, Tom has never been able to go with me because he always has to work on Thursdays. But today, he was free enough in the morning to be able to go with Trina and I. It was so nice to go together! The class was on the Sacrament, and I’ll put my notes in my other blog. I worked on projects for Tom all the rest of the day. Tom relaxed and watched tv with Geneva cuddled up to him. He loves cuddling with his grandchildren! About 2:45 Caeli called me and reminded me that I was supposed to have picked her up at 2:30! I hurried and got in the car and ran to get her. I felt so bad that I forgot! All day Ziona was happily roller skating arou...

1/17         It feels good to be focused on what’s important. I’m going to create a bullet journal, probably on the computer, to be able to mark when I do what I’m trying to focus on, and a few other things I want to track. Tom was in meetings all day again, so I worked on other computer things while watching movies. In the evening, his company had a dinner that spouses were  invited to, so he came back to pick me up. The dinner was really delicious. Dave Price had it catered by a guy they know in Discovery Bay where they live. He came all the way to Fresno to cater for us. We had cole slaw, potato salad, tri tip, pulled pork, BBQ ribs, Mac n Cheese, and chicken. It was a little heavy on the meat as opposed to vegetables, but it was all really good. They had cookies and cupcakes for dessert. They looked like they were from Costco or something. At these company dinners, they always do a short presentation. One of the owners of the company is Steve S...

1/16     Thought for the day:  How much more satisfying our years may be if in our accumulation of knowledge, in our relationships with others, in our business affairs, in our courtship and marriage, and in our family rearing, we recognize that we form each day the stuff of which eternity is made. Brothers and sisters, life is forever. Live each day as if you were going to live eternally, for you surely shall. ("Pillars of Truth,"  Ensign , Jan. 1994, 4) Gordon B Hinkley On another note, When I went to Tanya's ward as a stake visitor on Sunday, there were a few things in the lesson that I really liked. The lesson was basically from Larry Lawrence's last talk in conference called, "What lack I yet?", and was about continued progression. That day I was feeling a bit depressed as a result of Sarah coming back into our lives, and my same feelings of "I'm a terrible person because I don't want a drug addict in my home". I know Tom will do any...

My favorite quote for the day:  The Savior is omnipotent. He is omniscient. With all this power and knowledge, what does He choose to do with His time? His whole purpose in being is to serve others by bringing to pass their immortality and eternal life. He has no other interest. His desire, which seems insatiable, is to lift others. He has an absolute, righteous need for an eternal expression, or outlet, for His infinite love. ( Spiritual Plateaus  [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1991], 107) 1/15     Tom got to stay home all day today. It was so nice! He had a few important phone calls in the morning, but after that we got to be together.We worked on a few in-house items. It was fun. Tanya and family came over in the afternoon and brought pizza for dinner. Everyone sat around and watched some old Monk episodes. Lots of fun. The kids played and played. It is a favorite scene to have 4 or 5 people all cuddled up on the couches together. 

1/14      The phone rang at 6am. For the first time in a long time, Tom didn’t have early morning Sunday meetings, so we were going to leave for Church about 8am. I jumped out of bed and grabbed Tom’s phone and handed it to him. He hadn’t even heard it ring. It was Sarah’s (the homeless drug addict we tried to help) mother.  Actually, I should back up and say that about a month ago her Sarah's mother called to see if Tom had heard from her. She said nobody had heard from her, not even her children, who she usually calls daily. She was afraid she was dead somewhere and she would never know.  So this morning the mother was frantic that Sarah needed help. She quickly passed the phone to Sarah’s brother. He said Sarah had taken a taxi to his house from the hospital and he couldn’t have her there. They wanted Tom to take her. Tom asked me, and I reminded him that after Sarah left the shelter that we worked so hard to get her into, we were done helping h...

1/13/18          I really didn't want to wake up this morning in time to go to the vineyard by 8am, but I dragged myself out of bed and went - not too happily. The thing about the vineyard is like any other service – service makes you happy. The rows to work are so incredibly long. It seems like you can’t even see the end when you start one, but you work slowly and slowly you eventually can see the end in a distance, and slowly it gets closer and closer. But when you finally get to the end, you have to move to another row and work your way all the way back to the car. We were there almost 3 hours. I raked leaves off the berm and Tom used a hoe to take out the weeds on the berm. Such fun.     There were other members from our ward there who worked on pruning, repairing or replacing the stakes, and hammering in the nails that hold the wires. One family who are super faithful and seem to go the extra mile in every serv...

1/12    I spent a couple of days sewing. It was really fun. I had bought a couple of dresses at the thrift store that I wanted to make into skirts. One is white and long and so pretty, but I had so many problems trying to remake it! I just didn’t want to give up because the fabric is so pretty. I finally got it mostly done. I just need to buy some lining fabric to go under it. I also had one that was black and white print that I had to make from a dress to a skirt. It went much easier. I also wanted to make some shopping bags that I can fold with a snap to hold them that way. Like this: I worked on one but everything was going wrong and when the bobbin thread ran out again, I decided to quit for the night. The Pettus kids are so fun to have here. Christian is always full of interesting information, like why people feel cold when they have a fever. I see the same ability developing in Dexter. He was explaining something scientific to me this morning; I can't...

1/11/18 Trina went with me to Laurel Lawrence’s class on “Tips for studying scriptures” in the morning. It was really good and I will post notes from it on my other blog when I get a chance. It was nice to have Trina with me. We came home and I worked on the dragon. I sewed the left wing together wrong 2 times! There were quite a few other things that I had to undo and re-do, which made it a very long project. The wings alone took 2 weeks.  I think Trina and I have spent over a month crocheting. At times it was really fun; at other times I just wanted it to be DONE.  Well, today I finished it. Finished! Hooray! Now I can’t wait to give it to Nina. But I have to wait for Trina to finish hers so she can give it to Mila at the same time.   At 2:30 I went to pick up Caeli. I dropped her at her house and since I had an appointment to get my hair cut at 4pm, I didn’t want to go back home, so I wandered around Goodwill for a little while. I found a cute red...

More Crochet 1/10/18            I needed to make a run to my credit union first thing this morning. This credit union always has very, very long lines, so I wanted to be one of the first to get in. I made it, and got what I needed and ran errands on the way home.  Geneva, Caeli, and Ziona are fascinated with makeup. G & C are 14 and Ziona is 6, so those are the ages of make-up fascination. They’ve been using my make up at least once a week to get pretty, and my make-up is getting messy and used up, so I decided to gift them most of it and get myself new stuff. Hooray for new stuff.  I needed some anyway. I spent the afternoon working on the dragon. Tom and I went to the church for the organ lessons and mutual. I have a new student, a middle age woman who I really didn’t think would last very long. I figured as soon as she saw how hard it is, she would quit. She’s only had a few lessons, but I’m pleasantly su...

1/9         I’m determined to finish the dragon I’m trying to crochet for Nina, so I worked on it ALL DAY. My fingers hurt and my hands hurt, but I watched some good movies on the TCM channel while I crocheted. I enjoyed the old version of Pride and Prejudice the most. I’m actually ahead of Trina now, so I’ll have to wait for her to catch up so she can help me with the next step in the directions. We're pretty sure we've been working on them for a month now. Tom had to go somewhere far away and got rained on a lot while passing out flyers. In the evening he had to go to the stake center to translate for someone getting a temple recommend. Trina and I watched some tv after the kids went to bed. Ziona kept coming to my bedroom where I was crocheting, opening the door, and yelling, “Boo!”, then running away. Sometimes I’d chase her, but mostly I’d just yell something surprising back to her. Eventually, she came in and set some tiny notes n...

1/8         It was our turn to host our empty-nester’s family home evening, so I spent the day cleaning. Actually, I spent all morning working on cleaning out last year’s files and printing reports for taxes. It was pretty fun except I found a bunch of places where the expenditure was posted to a wrong categories, so I had to fix those before printing the report.  I love looking at the report to see if our expenditures are anywhere close to what the budget said they should be. So after working on that all morning, I cleaned and cleaned.  It’s so discouraging to try to get the floor clean; no matter how I scrub it still looks dirty.  But Trina helped and we got the whole house looking wonderful. I started by cleaning the kids room. It is hard to have 5 kids in one small bedroom with very little storage, but it sure looks better now than before I started. I took many bags of blankets and pillows out to put in storage while they a...

Jan 7      Tom was awfully happy to have a new suit to wear to church. He looks so handsome! (as always) Actually, the new suit looks so much like his other one that nobody noticed. He’s very consistent in his taste.   Church was good, as always. It was fun to see how our ward Relief Society did with the new program that started this year. I thought they did very well. Tom had another commitment after church – something at the stake center with the stake president that he couldn’t talk about, so I assume it was a confidential member thing. I went home and found Todd playing the piano. With the new year, Tanya and Trina’s ward starts half hour earlier than ours, so they were already home and busy.  I commented on how nice it was to have Todd playing the piano, and Tanya and Trina started laughing. Tanya said she had just told Trina that I would be more impressed with Todd playing the piano than with them in the kitchen cooking dinner.  Hah...

Jan 6 We went to the church, as usual so Tom could clean and I practiced. I haven’t been practicing much lately, through the holidays, so it was sorely needed. On the way home Tom needed to take a Christmas gift card to a member who he never was able to find before Christmas. He was glad to finally figure out where they lived and get their card to them. After that we went to Sears to see if we could find a new suit for Tom. He has worn the same suit since before our mission and he bought it 2 nd hand then. It’s been nearly 5 years and the first 2 years, he wore it every day. He was really due for a new one. We went to Men’s Warehouse last night, but their suits were way out of our price range. At Sears, we found suits for 40% off, and he found one that fit perfectly. He was excited that, as he said, “He can wear his new birthday suit to church tomorrow.” We finally got home about 1pm and he made some breakfast burritos for everyone. He has no greater pleasure than to fe...

January 5  Tom’s feeling a lot better now and was able to stay home almost all day. He got to relax and take naps and enjoy the day. I spent the day crocheting again. I worked on my list a little but mostly spent the day crocheting. I hope by next week  Trina and I will finish the dragons. It is such a detailed and complicated pattern.

Jan 4  I love it when I don’t have things scheduled. Tom dragged himself to work again and got stuck in 2 ½ hour traffic jam because of a major car wreck with a big rig. He almost never gets a day where he doesn’t see at least one traffic accident when he is traveling. I spent the day working on my list and crocheting. I actually was able to cross 10 things off my New Year's list. Happy days!

Jan 3       Every year there are so very many things that I need to do for the ending year, and so many things that need set up for the New Year. (Does new year always have to be capitalized? Spell check sure thinks so.)  I always work through them as fast as I can, but it takes time. I thought maybe I would list them so I can check them off as I do them. 1.        Finish off old budget : this involves making sure all transactions for the year have been entered in my spreadsheet and are in the correct categories in Quicken. I love working on spreadsheets, so it’s pretty fun for me. I get this all organized so it is all ready for when we do our taxes. 2.        Mileage calculator : The biggest part of #1 is figuring out how many charity miles and Tom’s work miles we accumulated during the year. 3 cars, and we’re not very good at writing down both starting mileage and ending mileage in ea...

Jan 2 - Tuesday       Tom caught a flu and has had fever at night – this was the 2 nd night – and severe congestion and exhaustion all day. I had a bad headache during the night and woke up still hurting. So we took it easy again. I was in bed even after I got dressed. We watched TV and slept off and on for many hours. I had a visiting teaching appointment, but  sadly and fortunately, they were sick and asked to postpone. We needed to leave for a short while around 3pm. It actually felt good to be vertical and get some fresh air. When we got back we relaxed some more. Nothing feels better than sleeping when you don’t feel great. It’s so sad to have Tom sick. He only gets sick about once a year, but when he is, it makes me so sad. He seems invincible the rest of the time. Poor guy. One of the times I was lying in bed, I saw Ziona in the back yard, sweeping the patio. She is such a little sweetheart!

1/1         New Year’s Day Wow. I never really thought I’d live this long. I grew up thinking the millennium would come long before this. Well, we carry on and are glad to still be enjoying every new day and every New Year. I’ve never planned big things to celebrate the New Year. I focus so much on Christmas, leading up to it, having people over, having a nice Christmas Eve program, having wonderful food, and having appropriate gifts for everyone, and on and on. So when Christmas has passed and I’ve cleaned up all the decorations and messes, I don’t have much interest in planning a “party” or activities and another big celebratory meal. So we relaxed and ate leftovers all day. I cleaned up the last of the Christmas decorations inside and got all the lights off that I could reach outside. Tom got the rest of the lights off and helped me take apart the Christmas tree.  We played some games that we got for Christmas. I got one called ...

Our Bishop decided to have only Sacrament meeting again this week. It was so nice to be able to leave after only an hour, instead of spending most of the day in meetings. (3 hour block + choir practice + visiting other wards + evening meetings + visiting members, etc.) We wanted to go to Dublin to see Mila on her birthday today. They weren’t going to be home until after 2pm, so we left here at noon. That gave us time to go home and change and gather what we needed to take. We got to the bay area and were passing through Livermore when they said they were passing through there, too, so we arranged to meet at a Mexican restaurant where we had lunch. Delicious, but it unsettled Tom’s stomach for a couple of days. At their house, it was so nice to visit with them and her about their trip to Florida over Christmas. They had great adventures and enjoyed their time, so I’m glad. Mila loved her gifts. Tanya and Caeli were still there, which made it even more fun to visit. I sure lov...

12/30/17        Man. This month (and this year) is almost over! I didn’t get up in time to go to the church with Tom in the morning where I would have been able to practice the organ for over an hour. Now I have to practice at home. I don’t like to practice when people are around because I think it’s painful for them to have to hear me do the same line over and over. Also, it helps to practice on the organ at church so I’m use to the feel, but oh well. Tom got us all outside to help with yard work. It was beautiful outside and not cold at all. It felt good. We pulled out bushes in front of the house that I always thought looked messy. It was really nice to have lots of little hands helping. We got done much more quickly. Our neighbors have told us that if we have too much garbage, we can put our extra in their bin. That’s so nice! So after we finished our project, Tom took the kids and we went to rake the neighbor’s front yard. We thought we’d get...