Monday, September 26, 2011

Serious Girl

My daughter got 63% on a spelling test today. She has never received a mark that low or done so poorly on any assignment before. She is struggling to concentrate.

She is more impatient than she has ever been.

Despite doing so well in piano, she has two songs she has not been able to pass that she has been working on for several weeks. She seems to get a portion of it perfect, and then falls apart in another part of the song (I mean that literally.....tears AND tantrums). The next time she plays it, the parts she does perfect are reverse. She cannot seem to play the whole song(s) through in its entirety.

She is a perfectionist. Her piano teacher pointed that out to me today.

She has been frustrated for several weeks about many things. She cries at the drop of a hat. She is extremely serious about EVERYTHING.

She is very intense.

Although she has laughed with and at other people, she cannot laugh at herself.

She is nine.

Besides the obvious....growing-up-getting-close-to-teenager-moodiness.....she needs the Holy Ghost.

I seriously do covet your prayers.

Monday, September 12, 2011

12 Years......

Yesterday I was married for 12 years.

Dave has long excelled at trying to surprise me and/or the kids. In fact, every tradition we have on birthdays and other special events is because of him. He started waking up in the wee morning hours to surprise the *special* individual. This is now a family tradition for everything.

This year, the kids and I spent the evening before (Saturday) at my granny's house. My granny is needing a lot of supervision and so until a long term solution is found, my sisters and I share this responsibility. Because I wasn't home on the morning of my anniversary, I *assumed* Dave would not be able to keep his early morning tradition. I should have known he had something up his sleeve.

Apparently on Saturday, while I was still at my own house, he tried to reach my mom. Not getting her at her number, he phoned my granny (who lives upstairs) to see if my mom was there. Granny said that she wasn't. This began a wild goose chase because.......my Granny was very confused. When I arrived there Saturday later, she told me that Elgan (her youngest son) was trying to reach my mom. On questioning my mom, she told me she did not receive a phone call from Elgan. My Granny also called my dad to say that Elgan tried to reach Marlene and couldn't get her, which concerned my dad because his other brother is currently in the hospital in Regina recovering from a very serious illness. He was wondering if this is why Elgan was trying to reach my mom. He then told Laura. Laura called me to ask why Elgan would be trying to reach mom. As a result, I ended up texting Elgan, asking if he was trying to reach my mom, to which he replied that he had not been. This left my Granny.....and myself....confused and without answers.

The mystery was solved early Sunday morning. My mom.....along with my kids.....woke me up early to give me an anniversary gift....FROM MY HUSBAND....who was in bed at home! Apparently he plotted to get me up very early despite being separated from him for the night, by calling my mom, sneaking to her house without my Granny's knowledge, to drop off a gift so that I could have it first thing in the morning. This was who called Granny, and who Granny mistakenly thought was her youngest son. My mom knew all along and eventually filled in my dad and sister.

My Granny was comforted, and I was much impressed with my crafty husband. I thought the day couldn't get much better. I was wrong.

On the way to church Sunday night, he pulls out ANOTHER CARD. Dave is very, very, VERY good at picking out awesome cards. In fact, he's very good at WRITING awesome poems and really should just open his own Hallmark shop and write his own material (although he IS getting rather rusty at the poem writing business....**hint, hint.....**). Totally surprising me, I read the card all misty-eyed, and then found he also got me a gift card to my very favorite store. TWO GIFTS. BOTH SURPRISES. BOTH VERY THOUGHT OUT AND WELL PLANNED. What a guy......

And now the topper.......because our anniversary was on a Sunday; because we go to church in the morning and evening; AND because we had a corn boil planned after the morning service, we decided not to go out for dinner until tonight.

Therefore......we are continuing our TWO DAY celebration this evening by going out for dinner to a very nice restaurant. Our once-a-year tradition to a classy place. On our anniversary.

After all, it HAS been 12 years. And that's worth celebrating.