Just for you nana!!!!!

Hello!!!! I'm alive!!!! Can you believe it!! Sorry, not funny. I don't mean to run out on everyone. Life just always seems to be busy. You can all thank nana for harrassing my husband enough to harrass me. Not that anyone really is watching for a new post anyway. Joke, ok not funny either.

I too am like what Whimsy wrote about in one of her posts. I write blogs in my head all day long. When I go to check everyone else's then write one myself, my mind goes blank. Nothing is interesting enough, I don't have a new baby to brag about, I don't have a crazy neighbor with wind-chime phobia, I don't have ducks nesting in my flower bed. It's just me in the country, back on a farm trying to keep my 3 crazy kids in line (not that I am ever actually able to get them in line). Sometimes I can come off a little negative. Sorry about that, I don't really mean too. For me vocalizing my frustrations helps me to enjoy the good stuff in life a little more.

So here goes: I am helping my parents build their house. This is something they have been working on for over a year now. You think it would be done now but they are literally doing it themselves. I guess you could say this is my time and season for learning hands on construction. I have learned how to wire a socket. Such a simple little thing we all use in our daily lives. I can actually wire one and I've gotten pretty fast at it (for me anyway). I learned how to install can lights. Mom and I laid the backer board for the tile in one day. About 2,000 screws. I cannot even tell you how much my back hurt that night. For the next 2 days I couldn't bend over. Mom thought it was quite funny. We haven't laid the tile yet as the water is not hooked up to the house yet. Dad is dragging his feet. My main responsibility is painting. I have learned a lot by trial and error on how to paint with tape and not have it bleed and how to get perfectly straight lines on the edges. Lame but I'm pretty excited about it. I'm pretty sure that by now half of whom ever is reading this has already gotten so bored they have switched to someone else's blog.

Once a week I mow my grandparents lawn. They are 79 & 82 years old. I love spending time with them and being able to help them. They just can't keep up with the yard and house anymore. I think in many ways my grandma is revitalized by me being here. I am pretty sure she has spent more time in the yard this year than in the last 2 years combined. I've always had a special bond with my grandma and grandpa. I think all the difficulties my family had with my dad's parents made me appreciate my mom's parents so much more. When I was younger I loved to spend the night at my grandparents house. I remember how much I loved putting on my grandpa's very large irrigating boots (they are almost too small now) and head to the barn to help milk the cows (at least I thought I was helping anyway). I remember waking up in the middle of the night a time or 2 because the cows had gotten out and had to be rounded up. I remember when we ran out of milk we didn't head to the store (who bought milk at the store anyway?) we grabbed a pitcher and headed to the barn and got it out of the tap on the huge vat. My grandpa taught me to drive a stick shift. I don't know how he ever kept his patience with me. No one has ever known my grandpa to be patient in any circumstance. My times with grandma were spent watching 'Wheel of Fortune' and 'Little House on the Prairie'. She would tell me all sorts of stories about my ancestors. My favorite was always about the Holladay's being converted to the gospel, freeing their slaves and traveling with the Mississippi saints to Salt Lake. I get a lot of my personality from her. This time with my grandparents is reminding me about all these times I've been blessed to share with them and many more. I am truly blessed to have my children here with them. My great grandma Holladay died when I was 3. I very much remember her and treasure those memories. My children now have the opportunity to have these beautiful moments with their great grandparents. I love to watch my grandma as she sits on the porch and visits one one one with him. As I watched this scene play out one night I just stopped and felt the true blessings in that moment. It was almost like seeing eternity being played out right here before my eyes. A bridge between not only the gap between my generation and my grandmother's and mine but my sons and hers. A 69 year gap. I have many of these moments as I see my wonderful children interacting with my grandparents. This life I am living is far from easy but I do it because of these moments. I am truly grateful for my grandparents and the times they take with my children. They will never know how much they will affect my childrens lives.

So now I have rambled on and on. There is no way I can catch up on the last however long it has been. I will try to do better. I promise.

I should make one note however. I dearly love the Seattle area. I don't know exactly why, I can't put it into words. My favorite thing though would have to be the people there. I was born and raised her in Idaho but a part of my heart will always belong there in Washington. I found a true home there. Not the house/apartment we lived in but a place where I could truly be myself. We didn't have our families there but I found family never the less. My children had grandparents. I had true friends, the kind that you swear you've known forever, the kind that take care of you and watch out for you, soul sisters I guess you could say. I think part of the reason I didn't post sooner is that it just seemed too hard. I miss it there so much. I miss all of you.