End of Summer = New School+New Things for Adult Children= Excitement and Trepidation

Anther post from early August that never got posted.  I'll add comments in purple with updates where applicable.

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Where has summer gone ? ! ?

The kids start school on September 1.  The MACCRAY (Maynard, Clara City, Raymond) school district is about 1/2 again as large as Red Lake County Central, but from what contact we've had so far, it still seems like a very personal and caring atmosphere.  Just as we had up north,  there are several school workers among our members.

Sophie and Clara will be in school here in town, just a mile away.  Our younger kids will be in the neighboring city of Maynard, seven miles away.  That seems blessedly close compared to the distance our kids used to have to travel to school.  The junior high/high school in Oklee was 13 miles away, and the elementary school in Plummer was 17 miles from where we lived.

MACCRAY has a four day school week for at least the next year.  I'm excited about that.  When we first put our kids in public school five years ago, one of the neighboring districts had a four day week.  I remember saying to some of the other moms that I would really enjoy that extra day with my kids.  Well, now I get that extra day and I'm tickled pink.

Another change for us this year will be that the high school and part of the elementary is what's considered an iPad school.  My kids have had tablets.  I'm not impressed.  I was assured by the counselor we talked to regarding enrolling our kids, that the iPads they use in the schools are strong and durable.  I hope this is true.  I do not relish the thought of forking over replacement money when my chronically destructive children damage their iPads.  Oy weh.  Some of the kids are excited.  They think the idea of having a gadget/device that they are allowed to use in school is pretty cool.

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So far, no broken iPads.  In the elementary school the kids leave them in cubbies at school when not in use. "That's a mercy anyhow!"

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Louisa has moved to Moorhead into an apartment with some girlfriends.  Whitney is one of Louisa's best friends from up north.  The girls have known each other since they were six.  Sabrina became a good friend of theirs this past year in the MSUM Nelson Hall.  Louisa has just a couple of prerequisites to take before applying for nursing school at M-State, so she has registered to take them on-line this fall and put in as many hours as able working at Eventide Senior Living.  She hopes to start her nursing classes in January.

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Louisa ran into some unexpected snags with her online classes. She was familiar with the website through which she was to submit her work, but for some reason, her instructor was not seeing her assignments come through.  Because of this and other factors, she decided to simply work this semester.  She got a full time job at a day care and she's still on call for her CNA work at Eventide if she wants to pick up shifts.

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Elsie will be returning to Bethany in Mankato this fall for her second full year of college and her final year of high school.  She will continue to live with Lance and Cassie for now.  She has hopes to get an apartment with a girlfriend once she turns 18 in January, but that option is still being, .... bandied around.  I'm in much less of a hurry for her to grow up than is she.  Because of the difference in graduations requirements between Oklee and Clara City, Elsie will graduate from RLCC in Oklee on May 27, 2016.  She is in fact in Oklee this weekend to take care of some school related business and to see her friends from there.  Elsie will move to Mankato next weekend.'

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Elsie seems to be doing well.  She is still working at Hillrest nursing home in Mankato, but has limited the number of shifts she can do in a two week period to five so she has more time for school.  

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Matt is also hoping to go to school at some point.  Because of expenses and missed work due to his car accident, he has decided to postpone his start date once again.  But he is still planning to move to Fargo come fall.  He's been checking out apartments and filling out the necessary paperwork.  I've not heard yet whether he has found anything for sure yet.  As far as jobs go, he's open to just about anything that will give him enough hours to pay his expenses and save some money for school.  With his experience working for Quinten, and other summer workers heading back to school, he could probably find work for a general contractor if that's what he decides to do.  He's also keeping his eyes and ears open for anything else that might sound good.

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Matt has his own place in Fargo now, a studio type apartment.  Last I heard he still had one more load of stuff to bring down from rural Oklee.  He has a job, installing siding, but he doesn't start until Monday, since he had Marine drill this week.

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Jeremy has also moved to a new apartment, with one of his Mankato area acquaintances.  He's working at Hardee's to pay his expenses and is also continuing his various creative pursuits such as writing and electronic game producing.  He's also in line to start with the British Amway affiliate, Britt Worldwide, once he gets his driver's license.  

Except for having been mugged in Mankato over the summer, I think he is mostly happy with his life.  I'm taking him a dresser this weekend.  Then he can stop living out of boxes and be happier still.  

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Packing up the Sea Green Room

The following is a post I did during the packing last winter.  For some reason it didn't get posted.  It gives a little glimpse into what we were feeling and doing.  I suspect it was from late March or early April.

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I was feeling a little melancholy yesterday afternoon. 

Tues and Wed last week Elsie was home for spring break; she and I boxed up her possessions.  Then she said goodbye to a few friends and returned to Mankato.  She will not be home again before we move. 

Louisa was home for the weekend; she and I boxed up her possessions.  This is what's left of Louisa's stuff.  Her firearms and bow, and the dress she'll wear her last Sunday here.   Kind of sad and lonely looking.

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I will confess here that I was tickled when I saw that the congregation did not repaint this room. The pictures I took didn't turn out well, but on one wall, Louisa has light greenish yellow rather than the bluish green. I was skeptical when she first wanted to do this, about how the colors would turn out. But I ended up really liking it.

On the yellowish wall, she used the bluer color to write the words to a favorite song. On one of the blu-green walls, she used the yellower color to freehand the words to verse 4 of Psalm 23 above and alongside the double doors, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me."

Day 2 of the 30 day challenge

I chose this Chris Powell Level 1 Beginners Workout today.



This video first caught my eye because the participants appear to all be at least a bit overweight as am I. 

"If they can do it, so can I."   Being as out of shape as I currently am, I have had trouble doing even the beginning exercises on some videos.   I was optimistic.  

But as the video started, Mr. Powell went through the lineup of participants, and all but one had lost significantly large amounts of weight over the past year.  The only one who had not lost a substantial amount of weight was a friend of his who was just visiting.  

"Oh no!" thought I, "Even if they're overweight, they are probably more fit than am I." 

I wondered if I'd be able to keep up after all. 

And I'm happy to say that, yes, I was able.

What I really liked about this video is that it really, truly is for beginners. For those with significant motion loss due to obesity or age or other factors. 

One of the movements is simply getting down to the ground on all fours and getting back up, and repeating that.  He constantly reminded the viewers about the weight lost that the other participants had managed, and that at first they too had trouble with such basic movements.  

I think this would be a great starting point for someone with severely limited motion, strength, and cardio ability.  

Day one of my new 30 day challenge

I'm starting a 30 day challenge with my friends.  Each day, for 30 days, I have to do some sort of exercise.  Something I can claim as fitness related.  Today I did  this exercise video.  It's a perfect way to start, since I'm so stiff and immobile  these days.

Scary thing in the midst of the moving rush

This shot shows clearly the reason for the great joy we feel and the prayers of thanksgiving we send heavenward.

As some of you know, Matt was in a serious car accident a week before we moved.  He broke the left side of his sacrum.  Totaled his car.  But we are very thankful that is all that happened.  He had to be off work for several weeks and he had to reschedule his USMC annual training.  His boss, Quinten at Nelson and Nelson Construction was very patient and accommodating.

Matt had planned to live with a friend up north, Lana, the mom of the same Nelsons brothers Matt works for.  She ended up being ersatz nurse for him, and perhaps babying him through his recovery.  I definitely think Matt had a pretty good deal for his convalescence.

Matt now says he's pretty much back to normal, but during cold  and damp times he can notice the little bit of arthritis that came with the healing.

We thank God for allowing Matt to walk away from his accident with as little pain and inconvenience as he had.

The truck was balanced so precariously that the truck kind of rocked back and forth.

Catching up

I can't believe I've not blogged since before we moved  in April.  Wow!!!!

I'm not even going to try to make a nicely written summary of everything that's happened since then. I plan to write a few little posts on some of the bigger things that have happened.

But for now, some highlights:

• Sad to leave our old home.
• Excited to meet our new people.
• Former members gave us a great send-off with a parish-wide final service and a nearly all-afternoon going-away party.  We had a huge turn-out of helping hands to load the truck and finish off the packing.  And I am still embarrassed by how we left the parsonage.  But we are grateful to those who said, "Just go, ... we'll finish up.  There's not going to be anyone moving in right away anyway."
• New members helped much here, with unloading truck and unpacking necessities.  And they worked diligently to build a second bathroom in our basement.
• Living on the edge of a small town rather than 13 miles from closest smaller yet town.
• Farm fields across street one direction, much used BNSF railway line closer in another direction than our mailbox was at the old place.
• Kids can play in the creek and catch crawdads in one direction and can walk to library, pool, grocery store, bakery, in other direction.  
• Lesser used city park with playground and extensive green space right next to our house, and separating us from the rest of town.
• Tight fit in smaller house, still trying to figure out how to best make it work.
• Installed storage shelves and working on additional living space in basement.
• Louisa and Else came home from college for summer.
• We get to see more of Jeremy, less of Matt.
• Clara spent most of the summer at Tiffany Bs outside of Plummer, MN, doing farm chores with horses and other animals, helping with toddlers, continuing to train her filly, working for Doc Hagen 
• Swimming lessons and annual pool pass = very brown kids and mom, and some pretty good swimmers
• Louisa and Elsie working at Clara City Care Center as CNAs
• Joe's office in the living room = oft-frustrated dad and many spur-of-the-moment outings for mom and kids
• First one-day VBS experience: Jesus the Good Shepherd: prophecy and fulfillment.  The church here does three one-day VBS's a year, one at Christmas, one at Easter, and one during the summer.
• Helped Louisa move to Moorhead and into her first apartment.  
• Egress window in basement done.

Besides that, I can say that we love our new church and our new members and our new community.  Just as each pastor is wonderful and challenging in his own way, and each pastor's wife and family, can be both a blessing and a challenge, so too each new home and community, and each of a pastor's calls presents it's own challenges and blessings.  We are still getting to know everything and everyone here and they are still getting to know us.  But in all things, God is good.

The summer has flown by, with getting settled, kids coming and going, Bible camp, visiting new members, and all the regular stuff like meals and laundry and cleaning toilets. And eating and preserving all the wonderful garden produce our new members and friends have provided for us.

We look forward to next Sunday attending the installation of Pastor Jeff Merseth as the new pastor of Clearwater Lutheran Parish.  Jeff and Megan and their kids are very dear to us, as are the members Joe formerly served, and among whom we lived and made a home for over 13 years.  We pray for all involved God's richest blessings, and many years of joy through this special temporal manifestation of the Communion of Saints.

Every once in awhile, ...

Every once in awhile I am hit with one of those moments.  One of those moments when I see the concrete results of what Joe and I are trying to do with our kids. 

And every once in awhile, when those moments hit, my emotions run amok.  Happy my child is resilient.  Sad I can't do more.  Pleased our parenting seems to be paying off.  Frustrated that life is sometimes so hard. 

All of these and more.  But pride.  Yes, pride, good or bad, pride is a big emotion right now.   

Raising our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord is, of course, our primary responsibility. And this particular moment hasn't to do with that part of our parenting.

Besides that eternal undertaking, in the regular day to day things, we try to raise strong and independent, resourceful kids.  Kids who can stand on their own two feet come what may.  Kids who will know how to survive even if something devastates our American way of life.

Simply having a big family and living on one income goes a long way in helping with that.  We can't live according to mainstream society's standards.  We can't provide our kids everything they want.  We can't have everything we want.  But we can show with our creativity and life choices how to live "outside the box."  How to have a rich life in spite of doing it differently than many of our neighbors and friends.

It also means that as our kids get older, and they begin to fend for themselves, sometimes we have to let them work their way through hard times.  Flounder.  Come up with their own unique best way to solve the problem.  Each of the four oldest has gone through such times.  And each one has handled such things differently.  Feelings of stress, deprivation, jealousy, even bitterness, sometimes accompany such challenges.  This is adult life, right?  It's a hard world.

But as every parent can attest, sometimes I just really wish I could fix everything for my kids.  Many times, because of our life choices and the blessing of a large family, we simply CAN'T step in and help out.  Except by simply, "being there," for them.  In the long run, I hope that makes our children stronger as adults.

It is still hard, though, to watch them going through difficult times.

This little facebook interchange between Elsie and I led to one of those moments I mentioned at the beginning of the post.  The kind of moment that just hits me. 

Earlier in my conversation with Elsie, I'd asked her if she needed help hauling stuff home after her school year was done.  She said she couldn't make any concrete plans until she got a car.  I had not heard anything about car trouble.  And so I asked.

Wow!  It hits me right in the back of the throat.  I am astounded.  Astounded, humbled.  This young lady hadn't even let me know she was having troubles.  She is a 17 year old, living pretty much on her own, working 15-30 hours a week, while taking college classes.  She is also in track. 

And apparently, she's been doing this all without the use of a car.  And without parental support.

(Joe said he thinks she had been talking to her Grandpa about it. Grandpa's smarter than we are in such matters anyway.)

Elsie, I'm pretty sure that not every moment in the last week or so has felt as nonchalant as your reply sounded.  But I have got to say, you're quite a gal!

Love you tons.