The Seven of Us

This week I attended trek in Wyoming and had a great experience. I was able to meet a few new friends while experiencing a little bit of what the pioneers endured on their journey. I wasn't bothered by the walking, which made the rest of the experience easy to enjoy. I had a cool family, with the keys being the  parents (the Mackeys).  This is me with Kaylea, a girl from my family. Last night   was probably the best night of my life. I had the privilege to live my life's dream, ever since I was eight years old: pitching a perfect game. We were playing in my Babe Ruth championship baseball game, the last one that I would be young enough to compete in .   It was Haxtun versus SedgeCo. I started off the game with a 3-0 count on a batter, and I was thinking that I had better make some adjustments if we were going to win.   Fortunately I proceeded to come back to strike out the next two batters. After 3 innings, I realized that not a single batter h...

I hope I remember this day for a long time. Often, our days seem monotonous, hectic, or just unremarkable.  I've had a lot of those lately--so many, actually, that I was starting to be afraid that life was giving up on me. Not fun. This weekend, something changed. Yesterday was a good day, but I've had a lot of good days. Jared and i were able to spend some quality time together, and we went furniture shopping and grocery shopping and did some stuff around the house. It was  good day, but not an off-the chart-amazing day. Today  was an amazing day.  I was really looking forward General Conference, and I wasn't disappointed. (General Conference is a Mormon thing--it's a televised meeting that happens twice a year. Leaders of our church speak, and the kids love it because we get to stay home and watch it on TV.)  During college and at other times, I've looked forward to conference and been so uplifted by what I've heard. Today, I had that same experience ...

Our prelude to school was crazy!  We had about 11 doctor's appointments within a ten-day span in August:  physcials for school, which led to Caleb having an EKG and Echocardiogram, both of which were normal. (The doc was concerned because he had both a heart murmur and brachycardia. I wasn't worried about the heart murmur, since I have one, but the doc was concerned  about both together. Had I realized that my dad has a very low resting HR, and thought about the fact that mine is fairly low, I wouldn't have worried) At the end of a crazy two weeks, I saw that Haxtun was hiring an aide and applied. I was hired on the spot--one week till GO and still some doctor's appointments to go to.  Though I knew I needed a job, I had been looking forward to some peace and quiet when the kids started school.  Well, that went out the window.  But before I get into the school year, here are some pictures from July and August: Isaac went fishing at the town fish ...

Sometimes we meet someone who changes our lives forever.  In the seventeen years we've been in Haxtun I've met several of those people--most by accident. It's only by looking in the rear view  mirror that I can really see the effect they've had on me. Sixteen years ago we moved into a little tiny house with an amazing yard.  It was at 237 W. Bryan Street in Haxtun, and it sat just across the alley from an old man named Chuck Edwards. Mr. Edwards was kind.  He was certainly past seventy, though his awkward kyphotic curve made him appear older.  He was a thin man, and his personality was as modest as his physical stature.  He just went about his day--mowing his yard, taking care of his flowers, walking to the post office, driving to Sterling for a senior's dance or to Fort Morgan or Denver for an appointment at the VA hospital. He never drew attention to himself,  and he was always alone, though he had older children and grandchildren nearby.  ...

Don't save stamps. Don't get me wrong: I used to collect stamps.  As a teenager, I collected Olympic stamps. Then I collected stamps with pictures of exotic fruit. Finally, I gave up; my kids had destroyed my stamps, and  giving up was a better option than trying to save them. There's another kind of stamp saving, too.  Years ago, my friend Mike*  taught me about holding grudges and refusing to forgive.  I was better friends with his wife, Ellen*, who was an overwhelmed mom of five at the same time I was an overwhelmed mom of four. I saw her at least once a week, and we commiserated and laughed about the challenges of being a mom. It was pretty apparent that she felt that her husband wasn't supportive, and I understood her situation. Being a mom of many young kids is hard, isolating, and just draining. She wanted to go out and play like her husband did, golfing with friends and finding time for himself. She resented being at home ALL of the time. One day,...