It's been 4 years....

This is a long post...I wrote it more for myself, as a reminder of some things I should never forget, but you're welcome to read it if you'd like.


This month (May 18, 2012) Karl hit 4 years as a bishop. What an experience it has been so far. How he has changed and grown. His ability to love, to care, to listen and be patient and calm has increased. He is often tired, spent, but I've seen the Lord sustain him in what he needs to do. Because of his position he is more aware of the fears, trials, temptations and even joys of those around him, not just those in his ward. There have been times of great stress and sadness, but also times of great joy and strength and even just plain fun.


I wish (yes I really do) I'd already known some of the things I've learned over the last 4 years at the beginning. It would have made some things so much easier. I guess right at this moment, I hope that I don't ever forget the things I've learned. 


The last statement almost begs the question "So what have I learned?" Dare I share? It's not that there are any great revelations, more of a "I can't believe I didn't already know that!" Maybe I did already know some of these things, there was just lag time between knowing and being able to do.


The 1st year was tuff. We've always discussed just about everything with each other about work, family, church, etc. That first year (or more honestly the first couple of years) there was time spent on refiguring what we could and couldn't discuss. What could I ask, or not. Seeing that something was bothering Karl but knowing I couldn't ask specifics and I'd be the one frustrated. Many of his Bishop burdens can't be shared even in our marriage relationship. I've learned to say nothing, ask no questions, but hug instead.  I've learned to say I'm sorry. I've learned to ask more general questions. I've learned to talk about something else. I've learned that Heavenly Father will support him and that he, that I, that we will get through the tuff stuff. 


I've alway known it, but I've re-learned the Sunday School answers are truly important. You know the Sunday School answers to so many questions that are: pray always, pay a full tithe, read your scripture daily, regularly attend the temple, always attend your church meetings, fulfill  your calling to the best of your ability, do your visiting teaching, take care in what you read, watch and listen to..... We are a normal couple that often struggles, we are so far from perfect and I have a wide rebellious streak in me. Sometimes I struggle mightily with some of these things. But I will testify that I know the difference in my life and my attitude when the gospel of Jesus Christ is being attended to and when even one or two of it's aspects are not. I've learned more about what needs to change in me, that I'm grateful for repentance and a merciful Heavenly Father. 


I've learned more patience, with Karl, with myself, with others, with God. Karl's calling requires time. I have learned about waiting. The waiting is not all because of church responsibilities. There is also work, fire department and training for the big bike ride.  All families must make sacrifices to support each other in all of those areas. There are some days and activities in our family that I protect fiercely and there have been some disagreements about what those might be, especially when there is an emergency (rarely do emergencies happen at convenient times). I have learned that even when I don't count something as an emergency I need to trust Karl and his judgement in the how and when of attending to those in his care, even his family.  I have learned to wait patiently and with good will in my heart. It has taken time. I hope that this is something I never unlearn. 


I've learned that I can forget things I don't need to know. It is a great blessing.


I have emptied my brain for the moment...perhaps later I'll remember more of what I've learned and I'll come back and add it. Until then....

Numbers

I am the 3rd daughter, 4th child of 5. I have 1 husband, 1 daughter, 1 son-in-law and 3 grandchildren. My oldest sibling just turned 59, my youngest sibling will be 40 this year, I will turn 50 in a couple of months....just half of Great-grandad's 100. I will reach 30 years of marriage this fall, 5 years more than half my life so far, but just half of my parents 60 years of marriage, celebrated next month. My husband will have been a volunteer fire fighter for 29 years in Oct. I will soon reach 42 years of membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saint and will have had a temple recommend for 30 of those years.

These are all numbers that are significant to me and my life, but they do not define me. Most are simply markers, references in my life so far. If I'm smart I'll use them wisely.

Since I'm approaching 50, I've been thinking about Great-grandad (Otis Veech) and his 100 years. I remember him sitting at the window at Aunt Dorma's, white hair and mustache, quiet, old, small, twiddling his thumbs.......... sometimes I twiddle my thumbs when I think about him. He would look out the window at the train track and farmland, that I think I understand now, he loved. He was extremely hard of hearing, but if you talked farming with him, he'd hear every word. It was what he did. There are some connections I have to him that I haven't thought about in a long time....I got to live in the house he had built, milk a cow in the same barn he had, drive a tractor on the same land he did.

I got my 1st diamond from him. We all got one, his posterity. They were gifts to us, from him, in celebration of his 100th birthday. Men and boys got tie tacks. Women and girls, necklaces. I was 12 years old. It was so cool. I've never seen another necklace design like the one all the great granddaughters got that day. I put it back in it's box today. I need to take it to our jeweler friend and have it check out. After almost 38 years it probably needs a new chain and I want to make sure the diamond is secure. I want my daughter to have it someday, then her daughter. I'd like them to think of Great-grandad.... and maybe their numbers.

Graphic(s)

I mentioned in my last post, a site that I like for graphics. Lettering Delights and yes this is a link.  I'm not big at promoting things, but if you ask me about this, I'll really talk it up......  sooooo  if you enjoy fonts and graphics and are looking for a good site, read on.

While exploring a site is the best way to learn about it (they do have a take a tour option), let me just give you a few hints about this one:
*You do have to create an account, it costs nothing.
*Their variety in styles is great.
*They have frequent sales and for the past 2 years a $1 sale where most of their stuff is, you guessed it, just a dollar. Can you guess when I do most of my buying?
*They have frequent freebies.  (Gotten quite a bit of good stuff this way!)
*Although I'm fairly cautious (and cheap) when buying things, I think their costs are reasonable.
*You can keep up to date with their products on facebook and or with a newsletter. Both will tell about sales and freebies.
*Once you've made a purchase, they always have a 25% off coupon code that is good for 30 days on any additional purchases. This coupon is even a part of the confirmation e-mails on the free stuff and can be used with any of the sale stuff too! I don't think I've gotten anything recently that I haven't gotten an additional 25% off.
*They have a on-line TRY ME  option that allows you to create a Name or phrases with any of the Fonts or Alphabets you've gotten and download that to your computer as a new and complete graphic to use. (In a png format for the newer stuff, as a jpeg with the older)
*In the past couple of months, they have added SVG's to their product line. This will mean something to you if you have a Cricut and either Sure Cuts Alot or Makes the Cut. SVG's can also be converted to graphics with a free program called Inkscape. This makes most of the one's I've purchased of double value as I can use them in 2 different ways.

There ya go. I thought I'd share a site I think is worthwhile. Wander on over to Lettering Delights and take a look around. Maybe you'll find something you like.

Lost in Time

I've been lost in 2012.  It has been fun, but also disorienting. Sunday at R.S. Pres. meeting, I was off in my time line by a whole week! I guess that's just what you get for playing around in the future. Why? I decided it was time for a change and I just couldn't wait a whole year to do it...... change the family calendar, that is.

I've been making a family birthday calendar for my parents for years. I've also been using the same template in a portrait orientation for calendaring in whatever organization I happen to be serving in at church. I had found a calendar grid graphic that I liked and started plugging in text boxes and graphics and such.....saved it, edited it to use for another month and so on. It worked, but was pretty time consuming and was the same frame over and over, even if the fonts and graphics did change. The error rate was also bit higher with the system I was using.....too many boxes to watch as I changed July of 2009 to April of 2010. (As an example just yesterday I found a month in the R.S. 2011 calendar that has an extra day.)  I was in a calendar rut of sorts, (this is already set, why change it), but this year I finally thought...."there must be a simpler way to do this." So my quest began.

I personally need a jump start for creativity, so I looked around the internet at different calendar formats others were using.  I know, how different can you be...grid or no grid, but when you are stuck in a rut even that can be a revelation.  I looked at the tools I had in my wonderful programs, set up a new, simpler template and voila.....

This is the offering for Sept...our busiest birthday month.  The format is quite a change for us.....no grid and more room for fun graphics! My daughter and I like it, so we thought we'd try it for a couple of years to see if everyone else can adjust.  (A side note on adjusting.....it made me giggle, but the R.S. Calendar will continue to use a grid. With more to keep track of,  the lines do help. Yea, for the new template so it's no big deal.)

Am I back from the future, no longer lost in time? I don't know, maybe I'll move on to 2013 while I'm still in the mood or maybe I'll redo this year's calendar....now that it is simpler. I'll be keeping my eyes open for new graphics (oh how I love letteringdelights.com) for that's half the fun. We'll just have to see what time brings.

Finally Got It!

It has always been a fun thing for me to figure out a computer program I really didn't understand before. I got to do that this week!
I got asked to put together a digital slide show for the Scout Court of Honor this next week. I have used the wonderfully simple iPhoto and had fun with it, but every time I dabbled into iMovie, I just got frustrated. It has a few more audio bells and whistles than iPhoto and this time just seemed the way to go. My daughter kept telling me it was no biggie, that she would help and gave me a few up front pointers. Then as life does, things got busy, getting together before the last min. didn't seem like it was going to happen, so I decided to jump in. 
Maybe it was because I was doing this for someone else, but for whatever reason, things stared to click in my brain. I was getting the hang of iMovie, finally! In the end, the biggest challenge was finding music that was up beat, the right length of time and ok for a scout video. (I mean how would a parent feel about seeing pictures of their son set to "American Woman" by The Guess Who or  "Sharp Dressed Man" by ZZ Top? There are issues of what would be appropriate to consider....A suggestion was made to put a disclaimer at the beginning of the video that I had done the music and the Bishop had no prior knowledge of what I'd used....hee, hee, hee.) I finally found instrumental music that felt right and I  feel pretty good about the results. 
I'm ready for the next time, if there is one. I've figured out how to use both programs and combine their strengths, at least to a certain degree. Someone else may have already known that, but now I do too and it's a nice feeling. 

Happy thoughts...

some stuff I’ve gotten to do (in no particular order).....I’ve milked a cow, driven a tractor, plowed a field, gone tubing, camping, gathered eggs, gone snowshoeing, cross country skiing, taken a college course with my brother, tole painted (mostly by myself) one small key holder, laid sod, worked on a pig welfare farm, been in a road show, sung in a choir, canned fruits and veggies, grown a garden, gone hiking, walked in the pacific ocean, been to Mexico, ocean kayaked, walked in the redwoods, seen the Grand Canyon, seen the Washington DC Temple, been through the Nauvoo Temple, dispatched for a police and fire department, worked at a mortuary, worked in a fast food restaurant, lived away from “home”, driven in a blizzard, lived through an ice storm, driven an old VW bug, flown in an airplane, ridden a horse, had a phone on a party-line, listen to records, been to a live concert (Dan Folgelberg), climbed a fire truck ariel ladder, walked the narrows in Zion’s, known all 4 of my grandparents, known one great-grandfather, de-tasseled corn (midwest farm job), walked beans (see last), seen a midwestern sunset, seen a mountain sunrise, gone fishing, seen a midwestern pre-tornado green sky, played in warm rain, cut our own christmas tree, owned computers, been on a local pbs tv show (go seminary scripture chases), sewed clothes, snowmobiled in Yellowstone, married, had a baby, found treasure, been “scared to death” to later laugh about it, cared for 3 babies in cloth diapers for 2 weeks, had a dinner disaster, lived in the country, hiked Mt. Timp. to the saddle, lived in a dorm, lived in a basement apartment, floated in the Great Salt Lake, traveled between Utah and Illinois by car, seen Mt. Rushmore, had pets, have grandchildren, danced, seen God’s hand in my life.

He's a volunteer

The call didn’t sound good....it was paged to both ambulance and fire as a traffic accident with injuries and extrication. One person trapped in the vehicle and the car was on fire. Over the years I’ve learned to try not to think too hard about calls like that, till he gets home. So much could happen either way to the victims and the rescuers. There is the initial “be careful” to him as he goes out the door and the prayer in the heart “keep them safe, all of them”. Then you just wait for the report, but rather than think about it, do something else. 

There is something about a volunteer fireman. (That’s what Karl is.) They do this in addition to their regular jobs. They choose to serve in this extra way. They work hard and are trained well to do this “second job”. Each call they go on has the potential for danger, and while I worry about him getting hurt physically (it’s happened), I think I worry more about him being hurt emotionally.  Thankfully most calls end well, but not all. Sometimes it just doesn’t go well or no matter how hard they try, there is nothing that can be done or maybe someone even makes a mistake...those calls hurt, emotionally, every time.

Enough time serving on a fire department will show you terrible, horrific things...Karl’s seen them, been in the middle of them, some I didn’t really find out much about until several years later. Most rescuers usually try to be aware of the public when they speak,  but sometimes they are criticized for making jokes and “laughing it up” after what would be considered a tragic or dangerous call, in the presence of observers.... “How can they do that, someone was hurt....., a home was lost....., someone died?” the observer may ask. It isn’t disrespect, or callousness, it’s survival. I don’t know that I can explain it, but I’ve seen it and come to understand it over the years. There is the need to stand back and breath, collect oneself, separate from the situation even if just for a minuet, after it’s over before the evaluations start. Was it done correctly? What went right and wrong?  What could I have done differently? And those questions come first on a personal level... 

So why has he stayed, kept going on the calls? It is a volunteer position after all. Is he an adrenalin junkie? There might be a little of that. Is it the pay, NOOO..... For every sad or horrible call, there are many more that end well, because they were there, because he was there. This job is in his heart.....he cares and can still make a difference. As long as he can do that he’ll stay. And he’s not the only one, the department is full of men like him. I love my volunteer especially, but am grateful for them all, every call.

Tonight, their part of the call went well... fire out, victim out, then the pager went off again...