Summer is Over!

So.... I notice none of my other siblings have a blog yet. Are we going to do this or what?

We are all well...

CLIFF starts teaching again next week. This week he has a couple of teacher workdays but otherwise he's just enjoying his last few days of complete freedom. He's spending a lot of time working in the yard....he's cooking a lot.....he's taking naps every day.......he's dreading going back to work. He's still looking in other career directions.

AUDREY: I am back from Colorado. Isaiah and I flew to Seattle to drive with Jessica and her 3 kids to Colorado. We had a lot of fun driving, actually, and the kids were very good. I talked almost non-stop the whole time and Jessica was good at giving me thoughtful feedback. I really enjoyed spending so much undiluted time with her. How long has it been since we have done that? Have we EVER done that? We took an unplanned detour to Cour d'alene (I think that's how it's spelled) Idaho and even up to Missoula Montana, but they were beautiful places to visit and I was glad to have seen them. I found Grandma K better than I imagined, and I so much enjoyed being around her. I left feeling very hopeful for her recovery--at least her recovery of general mobility, if not total recovery of everything she's lost. Mom keeps her head up and is very consistent with her kindness, her kisses, Grandma's exercises, and plenty of optimism too. I hope to get back there at least once in the next month or so if I can.

Other than that, I am eagerly engaged in trying to make our family run on an insufficient budget, I am trying hard to discover in myself the ability to seek and accept the will of god. I am trying to be faithful. I am reading a ton, as usual. I am enjoying all my time with Cliff. He is such a fun husband. I am loving time with Rayne. I am looking forward to/dreading starting school again. I love getting back to the good routine but I miss the total indulgent freedom of summer. Fall is my favorite season, though, so I almost always love this time of year. I am absolutely LOVING my piano. I play it for at least an hour almost every day. It strikes a chord (ha ha) in my heart and I find so much joy and satisfaction in playing.

RAYNE is back home and getting bored fast. Her best friend (Caitlin Powell) has already left for college, her closest male friends are all on missions, her roommates are all far away.... But she and I are good friends and we hang out and we go shopping and we talk a lot and we go to yogurt. She is such an inspiring person. I always feel good when I am with her. She recently got a full time job at Nordstrom in Pleasanton and she is really really enjoying it. They pay on commission there (although the hourly rate is a bit above $10/hr) and on her first day she earned over $20/hour in commission. They set the goal high for each employee, but most employees reach it regularly. She is happy to have such a good job. Plus, working at Nordstrom has a certain cache, you know. I'm looking forward to telling all my Pleasanton book club girlfriends that my daughter now works at Nordstrom. The discounts!!!

CHASE is still looking for a job. He actually specifically wants to work at a video game store like Babbiges (I don't know how you really spell that, but I know I've got it wrong here) or Game Stop. He's applied, he's called and he'll go on checking back in. They say they hire in October and he's staying on top of it. He starts his last year of seminary tomorrow! They are studying New Testament. Chase was set apart on Sunday as first assistant to the Bishop in his Priest's quorum. He is a very good boy. Adults love him. He continues to hang out with the other Priests in our ward. They are such a very nice group of young men. They just got back from an adventure camp out where they went hiking and caving and rapelling. They had personal and companion scripture study every day. They had testimony meetings and firesides. They cooked for themselves. Cliff went too and they both came back really happy. Cliff was particularly impressed with how committed the bishop and the YM presidency are to the young men. It was a lot of fun and a good experience for both of them. Chase said the rapelling scared him to death. They rapelled about 180 feet into a dark cavern--so he couldn't see where he was going. Near the end they were supposed to slow down so they could be snagged and pulled to a ledge that was the landing place. Yikes. Well, it was supposed to be adventurous and it was adventurous.

ALLEGRA is preparing for a YM/YW talent night. She and the other Beehives are practicing a dance (there is a former Laker girl in our ward who is very generous with her time and teaches them all sort of dance routines and helps them practice). Ally is also planning to sing. She has a very nice singing voice. I sometimes wonder what Ally really thinks about things. Isaiah has always been her closest friend here in the family (and her cousin Scott too), but she's a girl, stepping into young womanhood and so these best boys are not her most sympathetic friends, if you know what I mean. Rayne is good at helping her with hair and loaning her clothes, but Rayne has her own friends.... and Ally is #3 in the pecking order here, so sometimes I worry that she isn't getting as much positive interaction from the family as would be best for her. Anyway, there's always a child that I'm worrying about a little more than the others and this month it's Ally. I adore her and I see her changing and growing and I don't want her to feel alone or sad. She still firmly believes that she is a genius (and she is) and she is starting to get the connection between working hard and scholastic progression. She is an adorable, sincere, thoughtful, affectionate daughter.

ISAIAH went camping with his friend Sam Bennett and Sam's family. They went to Pinecrest and stayed in a cabin on the lake for 8 days. He went swimming, canoeing, fishing, hiking, etc. He caught and gut his first fish and he loved it. He called me nearly every night to tell me what he did that night and I could tell he was missing me a lot towards the end, but he was still very upbeat and enjoying every day. And he didn't come home hating his friend Sam, which is something--after over a week together. Anyway, that was his first major trip away from home--and with non-family, too. He did great. His being gone was one of the reasons I wanted to bring him with me to Colorado. I felt he'd had enough time away from Mom (me, that is). Plus, he was very helpful with Jessica's younger kids and he kept me company AND since he's the youngest, he's the one that would be most work-intensive if left behind when Mom is out of town for 10 days. Anyway, he's had a good summer. He's the kid who most often pushes me to get socially out there. He wants play dates, he wants activities, etc. He knows what activities are out there--church, homeschooling, friend, etc and he nags me out the door. I have a few unsocial tendencies and he does his best to combat them in every way. He is good for us. And it will be good for him to get back into schoolwork, too, because he has spent many summer afternoons staring at the TV or playing electronic games. He was within the summer limits of those things, but the summer limits are MUCH more generous than the school limits and it's time to get the balance back in order, I think.

So that's us, for those of you who are reading. I love you all!
Audrey