May 2015

5/1 - Matt, Owen, and I were in charge of Fairy Tale Friday for his first grade class.  The fairy tale we were assigned was "King Midas and the Golden Touch" (which is technically from Greek mythology, but whatever).  Before we told them what the story was, we had the kids write down their favorite thing in the world and after the read aloud we had them draw what their world would look like if they had were cursed like King Midas.  We had a lot of legos, candy, and someone even had a "lipgloss touch" as their curse.  We ended the day by handing out gold slime... it was a stretch to find something fun to do with that story but Owen and I had a great time preparing for it.

5/2 - Logan's Prom:  Logan invited his cute girlfriend Abby down from Rock Springs to go to the Davis High prom (her parents came too and they stayed the night in a nearby hotel - cute parents to do that for their daughter).  We all tried to get Bradley to find a date to go with him but he's not into the dating scene yet.  Logan gave Abby a necklace to congratulate her for making the cheer team next year; awww, it was too cute.  They went in a group with some of our neighbors and seemed to have a great night.

5/4 - Girl's Night Out:  We went out for dinner and froyo and I cannot say enough about how much I love these girls and how much we laughed that night.  SOOO much fun!

5/7 - Last Day of Chemo:  Four months, eight treatments, too many blessings and acts of service to count.

I have no words for how grateful I am.

May 8-10: Grand Summit Condo & Race for the Cure - I was so excited to celebrate finishing chemo and run in this race as a survivor.  I signed the whole family up and we decided to make a big weekend out of it and stay at our condo in Park City.  The weather did not cooperate in my big plans. It was pouring all day Friday with no sign of reprieve for the next day.  I told everyone not to plan on doing the race the next day because I knew it would most likely be cold, wet and miserable.  I had a horrible night's sleep and to top it off, in the early morning I just laid in bed and wished I could go to the race (but didn't want to make my family do that).  At about 6:30, after about 15 minutes of my mini pity-party, Owen came into the bedroom all dressed for the day in his "Team Heidi" t-shirt and said, "Mom, I'm ready to go to the race, are you sure we can't go?"  Well, that did it - I happily/tearily/determinedly jumped out of bed and told Matt that I was going to the race despite the rain. It was just me, Matt and Owen at the race and we only stayed for a bit, but it was so worth going despite the horrible weather.  Thank you sweet O-dog, I'm grateful for your nudge and support that morning!

The following are pics from swimming at the pool later that afternoon.  It was as cold and as rainy as it looked but those crazy kiddos had a fabulous time.

5/11 - Mother's Day Dinner:  We celebrated Mother's Day with the Green family the following Monday evening by having dinner at Mason and Cassie's home.  It was so fun to laugh with everyone and the night ended with a family baseball game.  I had to snap a picture of it because the whole scene was picture perfect - it reminded me of scenes from "Parenthood" which is one of my fave TV shows.  Wonderful night. :)

5/12 - Matt went on his annual fishing day trip with his work buddies... one of his favorite getaways.

5/14 - Vanguard Ropes Course and Year End Celebration:  It's tradition to do the COPE course at the scouting office at the end of the Vanguard year.  Lauren couldn't do it last year because Matt and I were out of town so this year we were both excited for her to participate.  Lauren is so enthusiastic about trying new things and when they asked for a volunteer to tackle the giant swing ladder, Lauren was the first to raise her hand.  She didn't make it past the first rung but she dusted herself off and moved to the rock climbing wall.

Her confidence and her spirits increased on the rock wall.  She went up and down the wall quite a few times before they asked for a volunteer to start on the telephone pole climb.  Nobody jumped at the chance so Lauren stepped up.

I was worried about her trying this climb because she'd spent a lot of time on the rock wall and I was sure her arms and legs needed a rest, but she felt she'd be fine.  She climbed to the top of the pole successfully, but while trying to transition to the ledge she physically and mentally shut down.  She was tired, scared, and didn't understand what she needed to do to swing herself onto the platform because she hadn't seen anyone try it.  Everyone was cheering her on but she was in meltdown mode and the yelling (although positive) was overwhelming her even more.  We finally got her down, but it was traumatic for her and she wanted to go home.  I talked her into staying to cheer on her friends and to her credit she stayed even when she didn't want to.

After only 15-20 minutes of rest, Lauren wanted to try the last challenge, the "Leap of Faith" off a pole.  I was really worried about this and tried to talk her out of it, especially since it was so soon after her bad experience, but she was determined to try.  The counselor, James, in the orange helmet below was amazing!!  He helped her feel better about getting scared on the last challenge by relating that the same thing happened to him when he was younger.  He talked Lauren through the entire process of the new challenge and gave her tips to success.  He was kind, calm, and an answer to my silent prayers.  Lauren ended this adventure with SUCCESS and the entire group was cheering so loudly.  It was an amazing experience to witness Lauren triumph over her mind and body, especially after the previous setbacks.  I love this incredibly determined girl.

Pics from the Vanguard potluck dinner party that evening:

May 15-16:  Lauren went to the LDS StoryMakers conference in Provo.  It was a two day writing conference geared towards adults and she loved it!  She said a lot of people were surprised when they found out how old she was.  This girl is so much more an 'adult' than normal when it comes to writing related things; she jumps in both feet first.  While she was at the conference, I spent the first day shopping and the second day helping Jackie get ready to move.  Also while we were there, I got the pics from Matt of the boys in the massage chairs.  He'd taken them to "Get-Air" but both boys wanted to have a little taste of Matt's preferred way to spend the time there.   :-)

5/20 - I got lined up and tattooed for my radiation!

5/24 - Lovely Sunday evening family bike ride in the north end of Davis County.

5/27 - Will went on a hike with the Webelos scouts:

5/28 - Owen's first grade program!  He was so excited to perform and kept giving us snippets of what to expect.  His favorite song is "This Land is Your Land" and he was dying to get a picture after the program with the cute dog picture that his friend Sam held up during one of the songs.

May 29-31:  Baseball trip to San Francisco.  Matt and Bradley met up with Micah, Gabe, Morgan, Mason & Cash for some b-ball games in Cali.  They had an amazing trip!!

While Matt and Bradley were away, we dog-sat a labradoodle named Scoffield.  His owner is Matt's cousin who coincidentally is a part of the family we got Maggie from.  He was sweet and Lauren was in heaven having a dog in the house again.

Owen and Will also had their final soccer games of the season (they were almost every Saturday of April and May).  Neither one of the boys is a huge lover of soccer but they both had good seasons with nice teammates and coaches.

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