10-Day Hiatus

I found out that Fall Semester at BYU-I doesn't even start until September 18th. But still. The thought of starting another semester, even if it's still a month away makes me want to throw up. Really. Actual vomit.

There have been moments here and there when I start to get extreme anxiety about not doing my homework. Then I remember that I don't have any homework. And then my heart relaxes and happiness returns to my core.

That being said, we just returned home from a long, tiresome, blissful "vacation." Because I have had about 5 days off between semesters the last 2 years and because Dustin started up a small business and seriously could NOT take off work for more than four hours at a time, we haven't seen the Pacific Northwest for 2 1/2 years. It still felt like home crossing over the 205 bridge and even though everything has changed... nothing has changed at the same time.

We left our house on Friday, August 2nd and headed straight to Bear Lake (Baby Bear Lake, as Jack calls it) where we spent Friday-Sunday at the Miller immediate Family Reunion. We ate delicious food, swam, played on the boats and jet ski's, and talked and talked about nothing and everything.

We got to my parent's house on Sunday at 11pm and spent the next four days picking blackberries and making 12 pints of blackberry jam, celebrating 3 Birthdays, school-clothes shopping in Portland, eating at Burgerville (multiple times), playing at some parks, going to the beach (eating at Mo's), spending 6 hours at OMSI, spending time on NW 23rd with my long-lost bestie's, and Dustin even got in a couple of long bike rides at sea level elevation.

My sister, Rachel, got married on Friday up at the Alderbrook Resort, South Puget Sound area. The wedding was beautiful and the weather was perfect. It was a good learning opportunity to teach our children (*ahem, ourselves) about what to do when you see 4 forks and 3 knives and 2 spoons in front of you. There were so many courses I can't even remember some of them. But we loved the clams, muscles, tri-tip steak, roasted vegetables, gnocchi, and all the drink we could handle. Lillie's favorite part was the dance floor where she earned herself two blisters! That is how fun it was.

We stayed at a large fancy lake house for Friday and Saturday nights. Saturday we drove to Seattle only to find that the 405 was closed which made I5 INSANE. We spent the afternoon at the American Girl Place (not as cool as LA, but still incredible for any doll-lover) and after my mom took the kids back via ferry, Dustin and I enjoyed our long-awaited 7th Anniversary date at the Mariner's Hall of Fame game where Ken Griffey Jr. was inaugurated as the seventh member. All of the Hall-of-Famers were there including Randy Johnson, Jay Beuner, etc, and we were in heaven during the ceremony before the game began. Besides the lady in front of me slithering straight sauerkraut into her mouth for about 10 minutes, it was awesome.

After our never-ending drive home via I-90 (15 1/2 hours), we were surprised to find we had both gained weight, but not really surprised at the same time. Thankfully we found out that the majority of that was water weight (if you had only seen how swollen my feet and ankles were. They had rolls. Actual rolls.) but it's still motivation enough to start buying Yoplait Light and fat free milk for a while. The next time I hop on the scale at the Doctor's office is going to be a doozie, my friends.

 The funniest smile I think she's ever made.

 

 

 

 

The end.

120 Blessings

Last Spring semester of 2012 Women's Choir sang at graduation. I wasn't super thrilled to find out how I was going to spend that Friday night after finals and jury's. Being in the I-Center was much different than I had anticipated, though. I was so inspired by seeing all of the students accomplish this humongous goal that I wanted more than anything to be in their place, even though I was completely burnt out from the last 3 semesters and was contemplating taking a long break. I decided then that I would be there in those seats in one year. The last year was so hard. It wasn't even just school, it was everything. Even after a successful day, I would still feel upset that there wasn't enough time for me to do everything I wanted or needed to. We were looking for houses, were juggling several callings each, Dustin started up his company, and after so much heartache, we were contemplating on putting in our papers to adopt a baby with LDS social services. Then throw in full-time school.

But it wasn't until today that I realized I received more than I expected from all of those long, tearful prayers. I finished school with honors, our children are healthy and smart, we have a beautiful home with a beautiful yard, Dustin's company is doing exceptionally well (and he even got a fancy company truck last month!), and I'm 6 months pregnant with our new baby. Sometimes it takes a leap of faith. Sometimes you take minute and just look around and realize that you must have done something right to have received so much.

I got a tad emotional when my name was read and the Dean of Arts, Brother Brower (one of my favorite teachers) shook my hand and said, "I'm really proud of you, Erika. You've worked so hard."

I'm really going to miss this building! Especially the Snow Café.

 

 

I was so thankful for my family who came to support me and for those who encouraged me all along the way. I appreciated and loved reading through the nice messages that were written in the cards. While being a student was very difficult, it would have been impossible without help from my close family and friends who I love.

 

Now on to the next chapter...

 

Recital Recap

The recital went so well! I was happy with how I sounded and was extremely glad to even get through my French Ouvre ton Coeur song without any major mishaps! Allison played excellent and Lillie sang so sweet in the song I arranged. It was so nice to have so much support there from family and friends and the reception was beautiful and elegant. Thanks to my Mom and sister and Mother-in-law, we had homemade creampuffs, chocolate dipped strawberries, and sparkling cider. Julie even brought a beautiful bouquet of flowers for the centerpiece. What a perfect way to close this chapter!

We're being cliche again.

 I wanted to get Lillie some sparkle Toms for Kindergarten, I just didn't realize that I was going to be buying them today! Thanks to my awesome Sister-in-law, Alli who keeps up on all this stuff, I found out about a basically inspired sale on Zulily. For the price of 1 pair of Men's Tom's, I got all three kids a pair. Red is pretty gender-neutral, right?
I can't wait for the inevitable picture of them all wearing them together.

And I think that's the first time I've been able to say, "All three kids." It sounds good.

2 weeks!!

Okay, well it's actually 2 weeks and 2 days.

Fine.

It's 2 weeks and six days. But two weeks sounds better.

This insane, crazy, stressful chapter of my life will be over! I can NOT wait until graduation. I will have completed 101 credits since Fall 2011 and because I applied to the FastGrad program, the longest break I ever had was 2 1/2 weeks off between Fall and Winter semesters 2012. Usually I'm lucky if I can get a full week off between semesters. So umm... I'm not feeling pretty creative right now, but if someone could brainstorm a more effective, appropriate phrase other than burnt out ... that would pretty much sum up how I've been feeling lately. Actually, apathetic is also a good adjective. It's not like I need to keep up my scholarships anymore. And I sort of just don't care.

Here's my most frequent conversation lately:

So, Erika, what are you planning to do after you graduate?
What do I plan to do? I plan to stay home and be a full-time mother.
Oh... well good for you for still finishing school. (or something like that)

The average income for a female who graduated in Music, or who plans to teach music, is pretty much what you'd expect it to be.
Almost nothing.
But I didn't go to school with any career objectives. I studied things that I wanted to and that I was interested in and I learned many skills and a whole new knowledge base of information. I didn't just study "singing" as some people might assume (including my husband when I first started!), and actually, my voice lessons took up a total of 8 credits out of my 120. The rest were theory, composition, pedagogy, education, history, and social science classes.... and of course, 60 credits of generals.

I loved going back to school. There was never one day of school that I didn't feel was worthwhile.
But now it's over, and I am more than ready to finally be able to devote all my time to my family.
I love the short talk here from President Hinckley in 1996 when he said that it's nearly impossible to be a full-time mother and a full-time employee (or student, probably). I've also been really thinking about this short 2 minute clip lately, also.

So those are my plans. And I can't wait.

My Senior Recital!

It's in exactly 4 weeks and thankfully I only have 3 songs left to memorize! Putting together a recital is like the stress of juries x's 100, but it's commemorative for me and will be a great way to end this chapter. My theme is "Songs My Mother Taught Me" (one of the songs I'm singing) and is sung through my children's perspective over the last two years. My sweet children also have memorized about 80% of my songs over the last six semesters and sound really cute when they sing in German or French. I am even singing an art song titled "Old Mother Hubbard" in the style of Handel and Lillie and I are singing a little duet I arranged near the end of the program.
So yes, everyone over age 6 is invited! Plus I'm having some pretty awesome refreshments afterward. It's formal and it's free, and we'll see if I can really pull off singing some high B's with my sixth-month belly and extreme issue of keeping my freaking diaphragm expanded.
Epigastrial-Diaphragmatic-Abdominal-Costal Breathing these days.
(Thank you, Brother Lindford.)

Balance

I'm not one for figuring out how to balance my life when I have a million things to do. You would think that after 22 months of full-time school that I would be able to figure it out by now. You would think.

So, I'm a list maker. It's the only way I can give proper attention to what's most important without filling my time with things with little meaning. I at one point in the last year had to make myself an adult chore-chart of sorts, except it included the most basic of things, like brushing my teeth, saying my prayers, reading 3 books a day to my kids, and making dinner for my family. Super embarrassing, but that's basically sums up my frazzled brain.

The plus thing about being overwhelmingly busy: I can go grocery shopping for an entire month at a time. Because really, who has time to bustle around Winco every single week? I make up a list of about 25 meals and buy all the ingredients for them. Vegetables will last at least a month in my fridge, but of course, a couple times a month Dustin comes home with more bananas and milk. Anyway, it saves a butt-load of money and has helped me become super creative. I would rather eat hot dogs on our BBQ with a suddenly salad mix.... again.... instead of drive the 2 miles to Winco and buy stuff more often. And by the way, recently I decided to start buying the good hot dogs (about 3$ a package) instead of the 79 cent package of BAR-S who-the-crap-knows-what's-in-there hot dogs, and it has changed my life.

I also have enlisted my children into folding laundry, even Jack can fold towels and rags good enough that I don't care to refold them. And to save another small ounce of time daily, Dustin has installed a real drinking fountain in our garage so I don't have to get the kids cups of water all day long.

But don't get me wrong, I still waste time sometimes. Last week on Wednesday I got so much homework done and it was so flipping hot upstairs and Dustin wasn't going to be home for another 2 1/2 hours and the only thing to do was to go down to the cool basement to watch Mrs. Doubtfire. What a waste. In a lot of ways.

So, tomorrow when you wake up, grab some paper and a pen and make a list of everything you want to do that day. Write down everything. It feels wonderful to cross off several things just from peeing, brushing my teeth, and getting dressed and making our bed. I bet you'll be more productive! Or at least you will feel more productive. And that is what is most important.