Sweet Sweet Porter

Harmon and Porter, picture from February.


This evening was the memorial service for Emily's daughter. It was a lovely service, and very touching. The service was held at a chapel located on the base. The primary children were part of the program and sang "I Lived in Heaven." There were about 35-40 kids lined up on the stage. After they sang the kids were suppose to put their carnation that they were holding into a vase. Porter was standing at the end of the 2nd row. He did pretty well standing up there and singing, after his initial desire to sword fight the kid behind him. When the song was finished he patiently waited to put his flower in the vase until there were about 3 kids in front of him. Then he turned around and took his flower to Emily with a big smile on his face. I just wanted to sob. It was so touching. What a tender precious moment, one when I could see the pureness of Porter's spirit.

A Wicked Mommy

Our pantry closet has five shelves in it. They were really narrow shelves so Micah got some wood and make them much wider, especially the bottom shelf. Now it is the perfect stool for Porter to climb on to get to the rest of the shelves. Today I caught him trying to tear open a bag of chocolate chips...where he learned that chocolate chips are the perfect snack....I have NO idea. Anyway, he didn't hear me coming as he was so fixated on getting into that bag. I leaned my head in right next to his and then bellered, "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING??" He jumped and guilt flooded his face. I started to laugh cause it was such a good scare. Then he started to cry. Poor kid. Then I kind of felt bad. I am so going to pay for scaring my kids later. Of course they will do it to me when I am old and feeble and have limited bladder control.

Extra Prayers Please

A friend of mine is suffering a horrible loss. Her youngest, less than 2, was accidentally ran over and killed by the neighbor. She had recently separated from her husband (not by her choice) and had her home packed up and was leaving tomorrow to go live near her parents in Oregon. Now her departure has been delayed and her world is in a massive upheaval.

My heart just breaks. I can not even imagine the ache of losing a little child. It makes me want to gather my children near and never let them leave my sight. I know there is not much that can be physically done, but I felt like perhaps a few extra prayers could help alleviate her burden. I know that she is suffering a great deal. Thanks!

UPDATE:
My friend's name is Emily. They are doing as well as could be expected in such a situation. She is having memorial for her daughter before she moves. Thank you for your prayers, I know every little bit helps!

A Thwarted Thief

Last week Harmon's bike was stolen from the school bike rack. Our new house is a 2.5 mile round trip from the school. In the mornings Harmon and I ride our bikes while Ella and Porter take it easy in the bike trailer. In the afternoon Porter rides his bike or hangs out in the stroller with Ella. For awhile there I was hauling Harmon's bike on top of the stroller when it was too cold to ride in the mornings. That was a huge pain. The new plan works much better.

One day last week I was running late so I drove Harmon to school. During the day I dropped his bike off at the school so we could walk home together. Then something happened that caused me to drive to the school. I don't even remember what it was. I picked Harmon up from school and totally forgot about the bike until later that night. Micah went to go get it at 11:30 and it was no longer there. I couldn't believe that somebody stole his bike!




The next day I called the school, but no one had called in saying their kid and taken a bike. I drove around the school, nothing. Then that afternoon we decided to check the bike racks. Voila! It was back, only not in the bike rack, it was at the playground. We went to pick it up and there were 3 boys standing there looking suspicious. They all started talking, saying it wasn't theirs and that they didn't know whose
it was. No big deal, we got the bike back, it had a flat tire and was a little beat up.

Fast foward a few days. Harmon's bike is once again in the bike rack. We were a little delayed getting over to it. As we head toward it we see one of these "suspicious" boys trying to take off with the bike again! He saw us, threw the bike down and continued walking home. My friend, Teresa, and I were in awe at the audacity of this little punk. Harmon got to his bike, got on and started riding. He rode ride up to that kid and was like, "Hey, are you trying to steal my bike?" I didn't matter that this kid was quite a bit bigger and that mom was lagging behind. It cracked me up! I was a little surprised at his fearlessness.

These pictures are from last summer. The trees around here are still pretty naked.

A Late Night Date

Micah and I had a fun late night date last night. Any time spent alone with your husband is a date, right? We had an unusual and fun time together. Micah is a pilot, but he is also the wing chief of flight safety. That means he is responsible for keeping all the flyers aware of safety concerns, etc. We went out to check out some red LED lights on the wind generators. A crew of Canadian pilots just about ran into one and determined that their night vision goggles weren't picking up the particular shade of red that the LED lights were emitting. Micah heard that there were some close to us. We drove about 45 minutes south west of Minot to find these wind generators that had these particular lights on them. The idea was to try to photograph them with and without the night vision goggles. I was a bit skeptical, but it worked! And was kind of amazing. The photos are very amateurish and not technically correct but you'll get the idea. I don't know how to take a good picture in the dark of night. And it is kind of tricky trying to photograph flashing red lights. But here are our best efforts.


This is a picture of the lights on the wind generators. It looks like there are two, right?




Nope, check it out with the night vision goggles. There are 5 there!! Only two had lights on them.


This next picture is of the town but also the large white blob in the center is a large antenna. It had a bright "halo" from 2 miles away than the generators did being 500 feet away.





This is the antenna taken from about 500 feet.

And here is the antenna with the NVG's. The antenna has regular incandescent bulbs. They are much brighter.

And here is my attempt at a side by side shot. You can see that the antenna has a much brighter halo. It was quite fascinating.

Overall we determined that yes, they are visible but they can cause a major hazard. The pilots could potentially miscalculate the distance from the wind generators because of the smaller light put out. They could assume that the wind turbines are much further away than they actually are. This is particularly important for helicopters doing low level tactical night flying. The generators are about 300 feet tall and they fly under 500. A big potential problem. Kind of cool. It was fun, but it was a late late night. I'm too old to stay up past midnight!

A Super Duper Mother's Day

I talked to my friend Jill today. She is in the 1st ward, which I just moved out of. I asked her how her Mother's Day went. She said it was the best ever. I asked her what the men had come up with. You are not gonna believe it. It is the best idea I have ever heard of. One that can't be duplicated too often, but man it was good!

They had a flower and a book (forgot to ask what it was) for all the women. Wonderful gesture. Then....this is where it gets good. The Bishop showed up in Relief Society and had the men take over Primary and Young Women's. He addressed all the women and told them just how special they were and how the ward could not function without them. (This is a small ward and many people are called up to do a lot.) Then he said that they had wanted to do something to show their appreciation so the men had made dinner! The women were able to eat dinner and visit during Relief Society. Jill reported that as the women talked, ABSOLUTELY no one had any idea what the men had been up to. Only one woman wondered where all her deseret pans had gone. Can you believe that??? I just laughed I thought it was so amazing! After they ate they watched a conference talk about the importance of mothers. When they were finished the Bishop mentioned that they might be worried what they were going to feed their families, he said not to worry, they had planned enough food to feed everyone.

How amazing was that? I was so impressed. It just tickled me immensely that they did such an amazing tricky thing. I have really enjoyed our time in Minot. The people here are really amazing. When you think of North Dakota you don't think of it as a place you would want to stay. I certainly did not, but I am continuely amazed at how kind, friendly and generous everyone is. The local people who might have family local still extend themselves to all of us military people who come through and create constant upheaval for the ward. So even though I didn't get my little potted flower yesterday (or a chocolate bar! I would have taken that!!) I am grateful to be here.

My 2nd favorite? Check out Dedre's blog and see what my cousin Troy planned. WAY TO GO TROY!! I loved this idea. I LOVE zinnas! SO CUTE!!!

Mother's Day Woes

First off, Happy Mother's Day to everyone! Great job plugging away day after day! I am posting a statement as well as a question, so please leave me your thoughts. What do you think of as "Mother's Day?" It usually involves some semblance of getting pampered, fed breakfast, the kids are threatened by dad not to fight, a nice dinner, go to church and the kids sing some cute song, and a flower or some other little token that all the youth or men pass out to all the women. Sound about right?

Today I got ripped off. I got breakfast and Harmon excitedly gave me his special towel with his handprints. check, check. All very cute and wonderful. We get to church (only a couple minutes late) and there are a couple of nice talks (ours were actually very good), check, the kids get up to sing and look adorable, check and Harmon brings me back a nice silk flower. Okay?

A little odd, but I think, cool a bonus flower. Odd though, because only mothers with children in primary got a silk flower. Sacrament meeting ends and there is no announcement to stay seated while we give all the mothers a special gift. WHAT???? I was so looking forward to my little stinky marigold, or pansy, or petunia. I wanted to plant it, nurture it and watch it grow. Really I did! I haven't always felt that way but I've been doing some growing and I was really looking forward to it.

Maybe I am too nostalgic, but I was waiting for that fun gift. And do you know what else I really wanted today? Hold on to your hats because this is a departure as well. I really really wanted a beautiful corsage to wear on my blouse. For reals!! I even wore a necklace that was my great grandmothers. It's black and orange flowers (rhinestones) and pearls. Very vintage. Very 60's costume jewlery and aboslutely fabulous. There was one woman who had a corsage. I was so envious. I kind of thought corsages were so yesterday, but now it really appeals to me to get to wear a beautiful flower on my person......hmmm, maybe I have been putting too many flowers in ella's hair. That could account for my change of heart. Oh well, I still think it would have been a fun thing to wear. I may have to order one for myself next year!

I think somebody else thought it was a bad idea not to have something for the mothers because a member of the R.S. presidency made cookies for everyone. Wonderful gesture and a tasty cookie...but come on, where's my flower wrapped in tinfoil? I called my mother to complain. Her ward was even worse. They had the "men" make cookies to bring. Yah right, who made all the cookies? The mothers of course and then they passed them out to the very people that had to stress over getting cookies to church by 9 am. Brilliant! That's just what I want.

Then my mother told me the best story about my Grandpa Ray. He had strong feelings about mother's and when he was the Sunday school president he arranged for all the mother's to have a flower. In addition to that, he had a lovely potted plant for the oldest mother, the newest mother and the mother with the most children. My mom says that he was advised by his Bishop not to do that again. He did again the next year and found himself released from that calling. My mom did point out that he wasn't being obedient, but I think he did the right thing! Mothers work very hard every day and they DESERVE all those special little gestures that make it all worth it. A little extra credit. So many of our daily task are thankless. Why not soak it all in on the one day when you can?

I can't wait to find a safe keeping place for Harmon's little towel. It was a sweet treasure and my boys were precious today...most of the day. It was a good day. We had a nice meal and had some friends over whose husband left today for 4 months. How's that for a mother's day...have your husband leave. Yuck! Over all it was a nice day.

But I still wanted that half-dead, semi-tipsy, precious, beautiful, tinfoil covered little blooming treasure that probably would have died. Of course, there is always the slight possibility that I am just a touch hormonal today. Who knows.

Carpet Art and Dandelions

I found this in my carpet this morning. Porter and Harmon were busying "drawing" in the carpet with their fingers. It is a nice deep carpet...perfect for pictures...I guess. Harmon did the one on the left nad Porter's masterpiece is on the right. I love Porter's. It is hilarious. Reminds me of when Harmon started drawing and would draw everyone anatomically correct!

Porter with his masterpiece.

It must be spring! We finally have some dandelions blooming. The boys picked some "just for you mommy!" Until we got home and I pulled out these cute little vases. The dandelions were quickly claimed and pleas for displaying them all around the house were just as quickly shot down.

And this is just a fun picture of Ella. She had eaten a chocolate chip cookie and her hair was standing up everyone She looked like she had baby chick fuzz.

Whoopsy!

Confession time...ever do something really stupid? I did. Last night I checked on Ella before I went to bed. She had pooped, so I changed her and put her back to bed. She was not buying it, so I decided that I should make her a bottle. I got a bottle, filled it with COLD milk, saw the chocolate milk and thought I might need a quick swig. After a quick little drink I took Ella up her bottle. I had nuked it for 20 seconds but it was still pretty chilly. She doesn't mind though, she'll drink it at any temperature. I leaned into her crib to give her the bottle. Guess what? I forgot to put the nipple on! I poured cold milk all over my half asleep baby. Then I had a very mad baby.

Feeling Sleepy

Ella was feeling very sleepy at lunch today.

She even kept on sleeping while Micah pulled her out of the high chair.

But she never let go of that bottle!