Crisis Living!

You know how the prophets have counseled us over and over to avoid crisis living? I know that usually this refers to financial matters, but the last 2 months this seems to be the best way to describe the chaos in my life. It all started the last Saturday in November. Mike had just finished writing his report for the 5th grade wax museum. He had his 30 second oral presentation memorized. I thought we were set. Never having had a 5th grader before, I didn't know how this whole thing was supposed to work. I'm sure his teacher sent a note home explaining everything that was supposed to happen, but it was lost in Mike's black hole of a backpack, never to be seen again. I was busy making a turkey and Thanksgiving dinner for our annual Saturday after Thanksgiving dinner with my brother and sister. Mike came up to me and said, "Mom, I need to get a costume for the wax museum." I told him that we could figure something out and asked him when he needed it. He then told me that he needed it by Thursday morning. That sounded a little rushed, but figured we would be okay. I couldn't do anything about it on Saturday. The turkey took priority. The next day was Sunday. Monday I was on call and couldn't leave the city. For anyone who has never been to Elk Ridge, there are no stores or schools here. We don't even have a gas station. It would have to wait until Tuesday. Mike was Steve Fossett, the famous adventurer and world record setter. I thought I could just run to IFA and buy him a cool little jump suit, you know the kind, the ones Grandpa used to wear. I could make up some cool patches and sew them on. It would be an awesome flight suit! Little did I know that they don't make them in children's sizes. They don't even make them in my size! So I thought, it would be a stretch, but i still have enough time I could make him one. So I went to the fabric store, found a pattern for a Speed Racer costume that I could tweek and make into a flight suit. I even found silver satin on clearance for 75% off! I was set! So I went home and got to work! I got it all cut out and started sewing! The second step was to sew in the zipper. My sewing machine broke. It would not sew. It would only make big knots of thread. This was not an uncommon event with this lovely sewing machine of mine. Let me give you a little history. I was given this machine shortly after I was married. My mom gave it to me. It was her machine. She bought it in 1981. It was a great machine that did a lot of sewing over the years. It was starting to act up and my mom was sick of fighting it so she bought a new machine and gave my this one. I have been fighting this machine for 11 1/2 years! Every time it breaks, about every other project I work on, My loving and ever so handy husband says don't worry, I can fix it! And he does. I have been trying to convince him for years that I really need a new sewing machine. Every time he just tells me that the one I have works fine. He can just fix it every time it breaks. Back to my story...I really was starting to stress out. I had a total of 2 hours to work on this costume on Tuesday nad a total of 2 hours on Wednesday. I didn't have time to wait for Nelson to come home and fix my stupid machine yet again. I called him up in complete frustration and I'm sure I said some not so nice things to him. I also may have told him not to bother coming home unless he had a sewing machine that worked with him! He came home without a machine, but did have his mother bring me hers so that I could finish this costume. I finished Mike's costume about 5 minutes before the bus came on Thusrday morning. Friday evening I took Nelson to the Bernina store in Provo and bought my Christmas present.


The next week Maggie had explosive diahrea. It started the day I had planned to take Maggie to have her picture taken. It lasted a week. I then had to take her in on the last day I could get the pictures back before Christmas. Last year I swore I wouldn't do that again, but it happened anyway.

The next week I was sick as a dog! I never get sick, but this was bad. I had the cough, fever, runny nose, sore throat, you name it. After a week I was somewhat functioning again, but still coughing and not up to normal. I was just thankful that I was functioning!

Morgan had a birthday on December 23rd. She is now a big nine year old! We had her usual birhtday lunch at the Chinese restaurant in Payson. This year they were giving out pens for Christmas and New Years. She loves getting any kind of gift! Last year they gave her a calandar. Then we went to Great-Grandma Skeen house for a huge Birthday-Christmas party.


We then had the annual Nativity pagent complete with "wise guys", camels, sheep, and all manner of crazy monkeys and angels. We have out grown the number of costumes. Next year I think I will be bringing my own personal supply of nativity costumes.




Because of the possibilty of snow, and the fact that my grandma lives above the Bountiful temple, we decided that we would take the truck to the party. We didn't end up needing the 4 wheel drive to get to her house, but it was nice to know that we were prepared. On the way home, it started to snow. Not a lot, but enough to make the roads very slippery. We had just passed 4500 South when Nelson said, "The roads are getting a little slippery. I think I will change lanes and slow down just a little." It wasn't even 10 seconds later that a black car getting on the freeway came around the curve a little too fast, started to fish tail, lost control and spun completely across the freeway not even a car length in fron of us, hit the Durango in the next lane over, where we had just been, and pushed it into a van in the car pool lane who was pushed into the concrete barrier. At this point we cannot believe that we came through without being hit. Had the cars not been pushed to the left, we would have been in the thick of it. We didn't dare stop, for fear that we would lose control on the icy roads, or that someone might hit us. Instead, we called 911 and reported the accident adn said prayers the rest of the way home thanking Heavenly Father for keeping us safe. We found out later that there were other cars behind us that were involved in the accident and that the freeway was then closed for several house while they were cleaning up the mess.

We had a wonderful Christmas and Santa was very generous even though he did cut back this year. I forgot to take pictures though. Sorry!

New Years day we had my brother B.J. and sister Katie and their families over to our house for a fun party. They brought their wii and learned that I am a very uncoordinated person!! They had no idea that you could turn into a giant snowball and roll down the mountain! I am so glad that I am good entertainment!! We were lucky enough to have my neice Kenzie spend the next 2 nights with us. We had so much fun! Morgan had been given a bag of fabric scraps from her Payson grandma and they wanted to make something with them. We sorted through all the scraps and found enough to make the girls 2 matching purses. They had to do all the hand sewing and did a great job!


Josh was feeling a little left out and wanted a project too, so we made a quilt for his best friend, Spike Mojo.


On January 9th my Great-Grandfather turned 102. He is an amazing man! He still gets around and is very sharp! We were on our way to his birthday party and as we were getting on the freeway our van died. It wouldn't start. We checked the fuel gauge and had a half a tank, so that wasn't the problem, he had power, so we knew it wasn't the battery, so we called Nelson's brother Kenneth who is a mechanic. He thought it might be the fuel pump, so we had the van towed to his shop and my mother-in-law came to rescue us from the cold. She took us home so that I could get the truck pick up Nelson from the shop, and then hopefully still make it up to the party. Our journey started out at about 5:00. By the time I had all the car seats safely buckled up in the truck it was noe 6:00. I started to back the truck out from the side of the house when I got stuck. Even with the 4 wheel drive, we had so much snow and ice that I was stuck on the side of my house. 20 minutes later Nelson called me to find out where on earth I had gone to and as was not very nice to him. I was very frustrated. It took me another 15 minutes to get the truck out. I was not a happy camper by this time. The helpful driving tips from my kids in the back seat were not helping the situation. I think another contributing factor was the fact that I was still battling the nasty cough the I got the week before Christmas. By the time I made it to Payson to pick up Nelson it was after 7:30. We didn't end up making it to Grandaddy's birthday party. Kenneth had fixed my car by lunch time on Saturday!!! Apparently the sensor for the fuel gauge was broken. The car said we had half a tank of gas, but in reality we had none!! So to fix that, he had to replace the fuel pump because that is where the sensor is housed. To look on the bright side, I am very thankful that we ran out of gas on the on ramp and not in the middle of the freeway. It was a much safer place to have problems.

My mom has been trying to get me to go to the doctor for weeks for my cough. I kept telling her that it would go away and that I was doing better. 2 weeks ago I thought I had pulled a muscle in my ribs from coughing. I thought it would go away. Monday we went sledding in our back yard for family night. I thought I was going to die. I felt like I had been kicked repeatedly in the ribs. I couldn't breath. I couldn't sit, stand, lie down or move without severe pain. So I finally broke down and went to the doctor Tuesday morning. Apparently I have had bronchitis for a month and a half and had torn tendons inbetween my ribs. On top of that I also have a sinus infection. I guess that explains why I have had no energy and have felt like crap! At least I am getting that fixed now.

Even though things have been very crazy around here, I also have to admit that I have also been very blessed through all the craziness. I just really hope things can just be calm and boring for the next couple days at least!