Letter to my Friend

copyright: Karen Larsen photography

Dear Friend,

How are things going?  I have been thinking about you a lot lately.  Is life going well for you?  Do you have any concerns or thoughts that are bothering you?  Do you know that I love you?  How is your family doing?

I hope all is going well for you and the family!

Life at our house is just a bit crazy and wild....not too much abnormal though.  Slim is home recuperating for the summer before he begins law school in the fall.  The boy has only had 14 concussions over the course of the last several years.  He gets dizzy if he over does it or if he doesn't get enough sleep.  Sometimes he gets a head ache.  He really needs to just take it super easy.  At this point, even a part time job is too much for him.  He has been over doing it for too long.  I just hope this short summer will give him enough rest that he can manage his first year of law school.  Crazy boy!

Spanky just broke off an engagement.  We are all happy and relieved at that.  She is a very nice girl, and sweet.  It was his first real girl friend.  They were engaged for 6 weeks.  He finally put together some pieces of their relationship that he was ignoring because he just wanted it to work out.  That's when he decided that it wasn't what he thought it was and called it off.  We dropped him and Sport off at BYU last week.  Two days later I got a phone call, "Mom, no one who I want to date wants to date me...."  Spanky, you have been there three days, maybe you should give it a little more time?  Ya....well.  I think he is going to recover just fine.

Scuff is finally in Brazil and making the adjustments necessary to serving in a forgien land with a new language and customs.  But he is doing well!

We dropped Sport off with Spanky.  He is a little slower to adjust.  I'm sure he will love it, but trying to find a job and pay for all of his own expenses and make his own meals is proving a little taxing......but it is coming.  I'm just worried that once he figures out how much there is to do and how many people there are to do it with, classes won't be so important anymore.  But all of the boys kind of go through that.  I guess it is just his turn.

Speedy now gets to make the adjustment to being the oldest, that is once Slim leaves.  We have already had the talk:  Now you need to be nice and kind and nurturing, the kind of big brother that the other kids can look up to and ask for help from when they need it.  You are no longer the obnoxious brother who isn't kind.  He is not too happy about his new role.  We'll keep helping him adjust to his new responsibilities :-)

Sun is pow-ing through pre-algebra.  We kind of quit doing math in the middle of the semester because we were overwhelmed.  So we are picking it up this summer.  Math has always been her favorite, so it isn't really difficult for her, we just needed more time than we had available.  And I just remembered, oh ya....she has an audition in August!  I guess we had better figure out what music she is going to be singing and start working on it.  I'll put that on my list.

Shorty just left for his first camp-out.  He is not too disappointed that none of the other scouts will be there.  He will be alone with four of the adults and they have some huge fishing contest tomorrow.  He loves to fish!!  He'll catch them, and clean them, but isn't so hip on eating them.  One day he and his brother brought home 9, count them! 9 trout.  What was I suppose to do with that?  We don't like fish!  But true mother fashion, I grilled them on the BBQ and we ate some of them.  (Then fed the rest to the cat...shhhh.....)  Yucky fish!

Smiley just finished scout day camp.  It was nice to have something for him to do every day this week.  I had wanted to take the kids to the beach today, but it rained!!  Bummer!  So we caught up on laundry instead.  Slim didn't do any laundry while we were driving to Utah for the boys (6 days!) so there is a lot of laundry to do.

And while we were gone, Spike Spike's allergy test results came back.  The boy is not only allergic to milk and peanuts and walnuts, which I knew, but he is also allergic to corn and soybeans. All of those allergies are a class 2 (on a scale of 0-6, 6 being the high).  Those aren't so bad, except I can tell when he has been exposed to any of them, so he is apparently a very allergy sensitive person.  But then he tested at a class 6 for dust and a class 5 for dust mites, which means, since I am such an AWESOME house keeper (NOT), I get to do a much more superb job in that department.  I spent all of Wednesday dusting his room and vacuuming his bed, under his bed, changing out his mattress, purchasing and putting on one of those zippered mattress bags, and washing all of his bedding.  And we get to get rid of all the stuffed animals and wash all of his bedding and animals once a week, vacuum out all of the couches twice a week, and dust each room each week, along with extra filters on all of the furnace vents.  Luckily I am good at balance and won't kill myself in the process.  (Did I mention that we have to pull out all the carpet in his bedroom and the other bedroom and replace the one in the family room?  Thank goodness that the Spirit had given me a heads up on that one and we were already in the process of trying to make that happen!!  It isn't done yet, but I had a feeling it was going to be needed so I started the process.  Yea for small favors!)  Anyway, hopefully by making some of these changes, the boy will be able to breath.  I think his nose has been clogged for about six months and his little eczema has been horrible!  Hopefully that will improve also.

Well, my dear friend, all is well here!  I am in good spirits even though life goes on!!  Also, when we were in Provo, we were able to spend some time with a dear college friend and his family.  It was a sweet blessing!  About a year and a half ago, he was diagnosed with a stage four brain tumor.  They removed the tumor but in the process he lost some of his mobility on his right side and it takes his brain longer to get the words out.  Usually his diagnosis carries with it a 21 month death sentence.  His doctor told him that it is not a matter of if the tumor grows back, but when.  He and his wife are trying to manage his health, their home, and the lives of their six children.  It was a sweet gift to be able to spend some time with him while he is still here in mortality.  It was also a great blessing to hear his testimony that he is not afraid to die.  He knows where he is going and what he will do there.  He knows he has made covenants with God that bind him to his wife and family for eternity and that those things will stay in place even after he passes through this life.  It was great to see that his faith is sustaining him and his family.  We dearly love them.  It is probably the last time we will see him in mortality, so it was a little bitter sweet!  But I got to hug him and hold him and his wife.  Then he had to use his walker to stand next to me he said, "To remind me that he is still taller than me".  The man is 6' 2".  Besides, who isn't taller than me?!  He always calls me "Caronious!"  Probably because I call him Darronious.  

 

Anyway, now that this email is a short novel, I should probably go and make dinner for my kiddos and sweetheart!  I love you my dear friend!!  Say 'hi' to your family for me!

Love Carin