Words That Came to Mind

The other night I was pretty irritated with a certain male member of our household (and it wasn't the male child). I was hoping for a little help with some various household chores. The laundry needed to be done and there was a large stack of dirty dishes that needed to be handwashed since the dishwasher was broken at that point in time. I asked which one he would like to do and neither one was a winning choice for him. He then settled down onto the couch to watch TV. I then asked if he would at least wash the silverware when I had finished all the other dishes. He said OK.

So I start a load of laundry and filled the sink with hot, soapy water so I could begin washing the dishes. And you can bet I was more than a bit irritated at this point in time. The irritation grew with each dish I washed. When I was down to the last few dishes I said I was almost done and his turn was coming up quickly. He sleepily mumbled that he would do them later. I said the water would be cold. He said he would add more hot water and that was the end of the conversation.

I was pretty boiling at this point. I returned to washing the few remaining dishes, muttering under my breath the whole time. Muttering about him sleeping; muttering about having to do all the housework; muttering about every perceived wrong. Somehow through all the muttering this image popped into my mind.

No, no, no. GO.AWAY. I don't want to be the good for someone else. I'm not done yet being irritated that my love language "acts of service" seems to always be overlooked. How hard would it be to show me that you finally understand my love language and show a little love by washing the silverware? Seriously. Or do some laundry? Come on. I don't want to hear you sleeping while I am doing all these things.

But the image wouldn't go away. And so I continued to wash the remaining dishes pondering that image and phrase. What would be so awful about being the "good" for him and letting him sleep? Then the dishes were done and it was time for the silverware. I made the decision to do the silverware and let him sleep. More importantly, I made the decision to let the irritation go about the whole situation. And with each piece of silverware that was washed, the irritation slowly dripped away like the suds down the drain. When all the forks, knives, spoons, serving utensils, etc were washed, I smiled a little smile as I watched the man sleep. It felt good to not be irritated.

Catch-up Post #2: Family Reunion

Over the 4th of July weekend, Dave and I travelled to Colorado to attend the R.E. Whiting family reunion. R.E. Whiting was my great-grandfather. As a child, I spent at least a week in the summer at the family ranch in Colorado. That is where my grandfather, his brothers, and my great-grandparents lived. There were always lots of cousins, aunts and uncles around. I always looked forward to our annual summer visit. My grandma's molasses cookies and homemade bread were always available and absolutely delicious. There was swimming in the creek (which actually was forbidden because the creek could be dangerous and there was never any adult supervision), riding horses, get pop from the vending machine in Uncle Don's barn. We could earn money for the vending machine by picking peas for Uncle Rod or Don (I can't remember which one had the pea field, but I do remember I only ever made enough for a pop). And even though this was my dad's family and he could rarely get the time off of work to go for a visit, my mom always made sure to get us to Colorado for at least a week every summer. That was no small feat since she was travelling with 5 children and the drive was 11 hours from Tucson (where I lived until I was 12) or the drive was 18  hours from Aberdeen (where I lived during my teen-age years). Yeah, she is pretty much a rock star for getting us there.

But after growing up, getting married, having kids and being busy with life, several years elapsed between visits. The last time I visited the ranch Katelyn was about 7 and Carson was 4. Then there was a family reunion in St. George about 8 years ago which we were able to attend. So over the last 25 years, I have visited with extended R.E. Whiting family members a total of two times. When I realized how sparse our visits had become, I made it a point to make sure to get to this family reunion to visit with my grandma, those various aunts, uncles and cousins I had known in my youth, and spend some quality time with my nieces and nephew.

Even though it was about a 17 hour drive each way, the drive was well worth the memories that were created over the course of the family reunion. We had family volleyball that didn't result in any fighting (honestly, that is a HUGE win), makeshift horseshoe pits so that the horseshoe tradition could live on, an auction with family treasures (like a map featuring the Whiting Bro. gas station, a ball cap with the Whiting Bro. gas station logo, a replica sign pointing the way to the Whiting Homestead in Arizona, a quilt tied by my grandma) and every meal together as a large, extended family. It was awesome.

Probably the memories I cherish the most of the ones with my brother's kids. Nate wasn't able to come to the reunion but he let us take 3 of his kids. Even though they were loud and crazy during the car ride, I'm so glad we were able to take them. We played on the rope swing, kayaked and canoed around the lake, took turns helping our cousin Melody with her special-needs twins. I hoped they enjoyed their time with us as much as enjoyed our time with them.

Now for a few pictures from the reunion:

A mountain bluebird that made its daily rounds around the reunion site.

Dave with Reagan and Madeleine

The girls convinced Dave to give the kayak a try. Too bad it was full of water from Friday night's rainstorm. Dave's bottom got soaked. The girls thought that was the funniest thing ever.

Travis quickly became a kayak champ and was ready for the kayaking he would be doing at scout camp the next week.

Catch-up Post #1: NASN conference

It is a rainy Saturday morning this morning so it seems like a good time to write a catch-up post as the boys are absorbed in Shark Fest on Nat Geo Wild channel.

At the end of June I was able to attend the National Association of School Nurses' annual conference in Philadelphia, PA. I went with my fellow Johnson and Johnson teammates to be presenters during one of the break-out sessions of the conference. We presented on our efforts to bring immunization clinics to schools. During the 2014/2015 school year we were able to host 10 immunization clinics in schools throughout Spokane County. The clinics were offered to children 4-18 years of age and were free of charge. Vaccines that were offered were vaccines needed for school attendance. The clinics were well received and well attended. We also shared information about a 'Clinic in a Box' toolkit that will be available on-line in October. This toolkit will outline the procedures/protocols for school nurses to follow to bring immunization clinics to their schools.

J&J team,  Cheryl Sampson, me, Dawn Epler, and Becky Droter

I learned a few things about myself while I was at the NASN conference. First, I really am not a "conference girl", meaning I did not enjoy sitting all day in a conference center listening to lectures and presentations. I tried to pick topics that sounded interesting, but even though sessions didn't really hold my attention for very long. Fortunately, we were in a city full of history and the conference center was only about a mile away from the historical hub. After I attended all I could handle of the conference on a given day, I wandered down to the historical district and absorbed all of the history that I could. I posted way too many selfies on Instragram of my touring.

 

I also learned that there are some things that really make me think of and miss Kate. One of my favorite things that I found in Philadelphia was the Once Upon a Story history benches sponsored by the National Park Service. These benches were scattered throughout the historical district and had 20-something young women as the story tellers. There was one gal who reminded me so much of Katelyn. It wasn't just that she was blonde-hair, blue-eyed, but it was also her mannerisms and voice inflection as she told the story. I visited her bench three different times just to listen to her and picture Katelyn in that role. This is kind-of embarrassing to admit, but during one story I got a little teary-eyed because I was just overwhelmed with my thoughts of Katelyn and I missed her immensely at that moment.

 

Presenting at the conference also reaffirmed my love for public speaking and presenting. My teammates expressed some anxiety and sleep disturbance the night before our presentation. I, however, slept like a baby (that might have been due to my adventure in getting to Philly) and had no butterflies or anxiety before or during our presentation.

 

Finally, I learned that conferences can be a great place to catch up with friends who live on the other side of the country. Last year when I was at the Johnson and Johnson institute, I met a gal from Alexandria, Virginia. We clicked immediately and have spent the last year exchanging occasional texts. It was fun to reconnect with her at the NASN conference.

 

She is a runner so we also got in a couple of 6 mile runs in the mornings to start our conference days off right. Of course, you can't be in Philadelphia and not take a picture with Rocky so we made sure to do this on one of our runs.

 

Next year's NASN conference is in Indianapolis. I won't be attending that one. However, the following year is in San Diego. Althea and I have already made plans to meet again in San Diego.

 

Flying home we were chasing the sun as it went down. I was able to capture a few sunset pictures over Denver to help feed my sunset obsession.