This Week at Our House #49

1. Everything we were waiting for and hoping for has fallen through. John has 2 new interviews this coming week. John's brother and parents took us to the Utah Symphony and then out to dinner. It was so lovely. We have not been on a date since our wedding anniversary in June. The symphony was amazing! They performed Beethoven's 9th.
2. I am having a hard time staying positive. I hope and I pray and I hope and pray some more and nothing seems to be going our way. I know that I need to continue to have faith in the feelings I have had while in the temple and in the blessings I have had. I know that faith proceedeth the miracle and that faith has the power we need. I cannot let fear overcome my faith. I know that more than anything, we need to use all of the power from Heaven that we can.We have been given so much help. More new, nice things came in the mail this week. The love and generosity we have been shown is beyond measure. The new washing machine has been such a blessing. I did not even recognize how hard the laundry had been until suddenly it wasn't. When I feel most discouraged, I go into the laundry room. The new washer keeps reminding me that God is watching over us and that things will be okay. Oh, and one more piece of news: I had a job interview for a part time job that would work out well. I should know by Wednesday.
3. Ruth had homework, homework, homework. I get annoyed with how much school takes out of my kids. They are gone like they have a full time job, and often they have homework like it is a second, part time job. And my kids still help plenty around the house. They could really use some more down time.
4. Kate had two big debate tournaments this week. After the second, she came home feeling quite sick. She still plans to attend school sick because she doesn't feel like she could do the make-up work along with all of her regular work. By high school age, I pretty much let my kids decide what they need to do about school and attendance. 
5. Johnny has been my number one help. He just cleans and cleans and takes care of the kids all of the time. Before he goes to bed every night he makes sure the doors are locked and all of the lights are out. Then he will get John and I a snack and a drink of water.
6. Adam had a book report that once again he waited until the last minute to get started on. He read about 100 pages on Monday and Tuesday and then on Thursday he stayed up past 11 doing the report. I did remind him every day for two weeks that he needed to be reading extra for his book report.Oh well, at least he gets it done and takes his deadlines somewhat seriously. He's pretty sick now too. I am not sure if it is influenza or just a really bad cold. I guess we will see how long it lasts.
7. Rachel, my songbird, has been in love with the song, "Glorious" sung by David Archuleta. She practices singing it and likes to listen to you tube videos of girls singing it. When she feels like she has it down, I will record her and put it on Facebook.
8. Anya came down with a fever on Thursday. She was the first to get sick, though it is hard to tell she is sick because she runs around a lot and gets really excited about missing school and church.
9. Joseph is just my very active boy. He goes and goes and goes. He is reading very well. He finds spelling and math quite interesting. We can ask him how to spell simple words, he sounds them out, and then spells them. We can also ask him math problems and he will usually figure them out. But his favorite subject in school is art. That is a first for my kids. All of my other kids, like recess best.
10. Joshua is extraordinarily disobedient, so John and I have become much stricter with him. Hopefully, that will help him know that we mean what we say. In big families, it is a little too easy to let the younger kid's behavior slip through the cracks. I try to remind myself that the older kids are doing so well in part because they didn't get away with a whole lot of mischief when they were little, and they got lots of playtime. I try to do both things for the younger kids, but life is different now and I really need to be on top of things to make that work. 
11. Arwen was pretty easy going this week. She didn't sneak into the medicine and or sneak out the front door, or try and flush a kitten, or any of her usual shinanagens. (She keeps her guardian angels busy.) She did try and change her own poopy diaper, though. Ruth told her she needed to tell Dad that she needed to be changed and instead she just went and changed it. I saw her walking around with a dirty wet wipe and a naked bottom.
12. Susan can sit up now. She loves to play on the floor and she is getting pretty good at going where she wants us to go. She surprised us by popping out her first two teeth. We didn't even know that she was teething. She is 5.5 months.

This Week's Pictures

The pretty and new kitchen aid mixer generously bought for us.

She fell asleep on the computer desk.