PHEW!!! This has been one busy week! I don’t know what I would have done without our good neighbor and friend, Leisha, who helped with the kids while I was teaching. She is truly a blessing! This week has consisted of cooking, cleaning, playing, teaching, eating, and sleeping. This isn’t really different than any other week, but it felt like it in many ways! Namely we were missing Andrew!!

I did enjoy spending time with my sweet babies though! During the week breakfast is one of the “happy” meals around here, in that we are not yet all wore out from the day! 🙂 (David thought his silly straw from Mrs. Leisha was very cool and funny! He wanted to see his picture.:) )

Emma has started to undergo a change of schedule over the last week. She would take her morning nap, but then play in her crib for over an hour before falling asleep for her afternoon nap! So I’ve been trying something different the last couple days. I have kept her awake during the mornings, and then put her down around one in the afternoon. I can tell she still wants that morning nap, and keeping her occupied and happy until after lunch has been a little challenging. However, she has gone right to sleep and taken really good naps in the afternoon. I hope once her body adjusts it will get easier!

SIDE NOTE: I dropped my cell phone yesterday, and it now has spider shaped cracks on the right side and bottom corner. SIGH!!! I half expected Andrew to yell at me when he saw it because I have had the worst luck with cell phones!! I am terrible!!! I have dropped them in ponds, left them on top of the car (and drove off), Emma dropped my phone in the toilet not too long ago, and now this!!! At least it still functions!!

Andrew made it back last night! WOO-HOO!! Only to have to leave again today. BOO-HOO!! Our dear choir director, Dr. Miller, from ASU is retiring this year, and they are having an alumni choir concert and retirement party on Saturday. Andrew is going on our behalf. Dr. Miller was a spectacular person and musician and he will be greatly missed in that department!

Andrew, Emma and I did get to enjoy lunch together today before he left. I made patty melts! Every once in a while I get a craving for a delicious, cheesy, flavorful patty melt! In the past I would have filled this craving by going to Steak and Shake, but there are no Steak and Shakes around here. So I made my own. The recipe I used called for rye bread, caramelized onions, hamburger patties seasoned with salt, pepper and Worcestershire sauce, and Swiss cheese. It didn’t call for that Thousand Island dressing sauce that is typically on a patty melt from Steak and Shake. I didn’t have any on hand, but next time will make sure to get some! It would have been perfect with the dressing added to it!

I bought a new area rug for our living room, and it arrived on my doorstep this week!!!! I love it!!!

The picture doesn’t really do it justice, as the lighting kind of skews the colors a little bit. We are going to go with the neutral gray color for the walls! I am also going to repaint our coffee and end tables. I can’t wait to see it all together!!:) Andrew is going to pick up carpet samples from our realtor for our house today!! So we will get to choose new carpet for our bedrooms when he returns.

While all this talk of the house and decorating is exciting, and moving has it’s positives. It is also a little stressful and sad. Here in a few weeks I will be doing a lot of “lasts”. Playing for rehearsal/service at Wesley for the last time, teaching students their last lesson, and saying goodbye to people that I have become acquainted with, and that are a part of my weekly routine. It leaves me with a very sad and empty feeling. I’m very happy and blessed to have known these people and places. I’m a better person for it.

I believe David, in his four year old way, is also feeling a little worried about moving.  I can tell a difference in his demeanor this week. He missed Andrew, and I was still having to work too. He had a little melt down Tuesday evening (I teach late on Tuesday evenings), and he cried for Leisha, saying “I miss my mommy”.  I don’t know if he is afraid of leaving, or us leaving, or what? We’ve tried to make moving sound like a fun adventure when we talk about it to him. We also tell him he will live closer to G-pa, Grand-mama, Papa, and Nana! Poor sweet boy! I know he will be fine. He is very adaptable. I also have faith that everything will work out for the good in the end, it’s just sometimes hard to see the end!

One of my favorite Ella Fitzgerald Songs, Every Time I Say Goodbye:

Everytime we say goodbye, I die a little,
Everytime we say goodbye, I wonder why a little,
Why the Gods above me, who must be in the know.
Think so little of me, they allow you to go.
When you’re near, there’s such an air of spring about it,
I can hear a lark somewhere, begin to sing about it,
There’s no love song finer, but how strange the change from major to
Minor,
Everytime we say goodbye.

When you’re near, there’s such an air of spring about it,
I can hear a lark somewhere, begin to sing about it,
There’s no love song finer, but how strange the change from major to
Minor,
Everytime we say goodbye.