As I mentioned before, I took a brief trip to St. George during the break between semesters. I drove down to Highland on Wednesday night (with a quick aquarium trip on the way:)) and drove to St. George with Shauna, my sister-in-law, on Thursday afternoon. We spent 3 days as Sheides in St. George and had a glorious time, despite lame weather conditions. We went hiking every day (on red rock; beside a canyon with thousand-year-old pertoglyphs; and close to Zion's park, walking through sand, dirt, and water beside and under gorgeous rock formations.) And we played in the indoor pool. And we played so many games and ate so much food. I didn't check the internet from Thursday-Sunday night and felt very free. And now I am back in Ammon, with a vengeance.
1) I put the car back to normal (unpacking, vacuuming, reorganizing the diaper bag.) Feel my sigh of contentment there. I still need to wash Brooklyn's car seat cover, but when will I remember to do that?! At least the thing is vacuumed and she won't be sitting on cheerios anymore.
2) I did several loads of laundry. I haven't put them back where they go yet, but they are folded nicely in a large laundry hamper. The very last load (before that car seat cover) is in the washing machine.
3) I am back to thinking about being careful to eat healthy foods. I try to be healthy most of the time, but throw that to the wind when I am with family. The consumption highlight may have been on my trip back from Highland to Ammon, with a Caramel snickers ice-cream cone, a king-size Twix pack, and a Baby Ruth bar. The scale says the apple I ate along with my junk food did not balance out the saturated fat calories. I will say I am not devastated by my weight gain, because I can't see the difference. I hope I will eat more healthily until my next family trip, and my scale will show me losing weight as a result. Until the next family vacation. Marshall informs me that this approach to nutrition is not incredibly healthy. Duly noted.
4) I am back to being an attentive teaching group leader (with several new instructors this time) and being a teacher. Classes began yesterday, and I am already having fun with students. I love when students I have had in previous classes take another class from me.
5) I am back to thinking about cooking, and buying food on a tight budget (thanks to St. George, and buying bikes last month).
6) I have returned back home to my planner, and it is too full.
7) But today, I also got back to teaching my kids letters, numbers, reading and writing, so I will pat myself on the back and check "update blog" off in my planner. I wrote it in because I knew I needed the writing therapy.
I'll close by saying I love my life. I love my little family and the family I grew up in. I dearly love my sweet and fun spouse, I love having a healthy body, and I love getting to go on adventures with family. I am so thankful for my calling with the young women, and for my my job with BYU-Idaho. I know I have been blessed so much.
2 comments:
I am glad you are back. Sounds like you are busy and happy, which is a good combo. And...since you mentioned it, I want to hear more about your job with BYU-Idaho. I have always wondered how it works when you teach at the university level (that was always my dream job). When you are assigned a class, do they give you the books etc. you have to teach and guidelines, or do you form your own plans? I really am curious, as I am considering going back to school once my kids are both in school (since I can only have the two kids, I am starting to think ahead to what comes next.) Your job sounds awesome. The main thing that intimidates me about going back to school to hopefully someday teach under grad english (besides people realizing that I am pathetically horrible with grammar rules), is that I would never want any pressure to publish. I figure I could avoid that if I got a job with a sufficiently community-esque college. I would love your thoughts.
Jenn, I'll email you!
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