Gratitude #3

Today I am grateful for the fall weather. I have had a fire burning all day and I am toasty warm. The fog has been blowing by my windows all day and the ground is soggy. I just decorated for Halloween and Ali is setting the table "fancy" in anticipation for the missionaries coming for dinner. There is home made chili in the crock pot and corn bread in the oven. I found my ipod and we are listening to music. The kids made a witch craft and they are taped up to our window as part of our decorations. I enjoyed having Cameron home for lunch and making his food and then eating it with him.

I am also grateful for cell phones that have free long distance to my favorite people. I love long phone conversations that make me happy. I can't imagine living without it and I am grateful.

Gratitude #2

I am really trying to think of those things I should be grateful for. Today it is my children I am grateful for. I had parent teacher conference today for both of my girls. I arranged to attend alone sans any children which really made it a mommy's day out even if it was only for an hour. I love the feeling of not having to buckle anyone in and just getting in the car and going.

I attended Ashling's classroom first. Ashling knows all her sounds and recognizes all her letters. She won't be tested again in kindergarten she is that good . And she can count to twelve but missed 13 and went straight to 14. (I guess she is a littler superstitious.) She is socially doing all the things she should be and she loves school. She is a pleasure to have in the classroom. I liked my appointment with Kindergarten.

Next I went to 3rd grade. Ali has a new job today and is in-charge of getting the door and any errands the teacher has. Ali's desk was clean and nothing was in it that shouldn't be. I was told that Ali is reading on a 4th grade 7th month reading level. She is good at math and quite smart at spelling. She is learning cursive well and she likes school. The only concern we have is that she slow down a little.

I am grateful for kids that are smart and who love school. I am grateful that they are not getting in trouble and that parent-teacher conference could be a good experience. I am grateful that my kids can be getting a good education and that their teachers are both so wonderful. I am grateful.

Gratitude

I haven't been very thankful for much lately. Instead I have been thinking of all the ways I want things I don't have. I guess that President Monson's talk about Gratitude was heard by my mind and I will try to involve my heart in it sometime soon. It was probably meant for me.

I know I should be grateful for a lot.

My 3 healthy children

Living in the mountains

The rain that poured on us yesterday

The ways we have found to support ourselves without a full-time job

The internet

T.V. shows that distract me

Pictures my children love to make me

Ali's soccer games

It is going to be cold this week!

Apples that I can pick

What are you grateful for?

It's Broken

Monday morning Ashling came upstairs and claimed she had kicked the wall and her foot hurt. This was while we were getting everyone ready and so I just kissed her forehead and pretty much ignored her. (She was not crying but just whining a little.) Emily also told me that Ashling had jumped off her bed but I assumed she meant the lower bunk bed and wasn't that worried since this was mostly tattle-telling and I really don't like that. I forgot about it will all the other things going on. Ashling went about her morning and didn't say much until we were in the car where she told me it hurt again. I was dropping them off at school and so I still didn't look closely and she was still not very upset.

In the afternoon she came home from school still whining a little about the foot. At this point I looked at it and then had Cameron come and look. It was swollen and looked painful. I decided to call the doctor and make the appointment. I didn't really think it was broken but I already had an appointment for Annika and so I just decided to make one for Ashling too.

By Tuesday morning Ashling wasn't complaining much and I was sure we were taking her to the doctor for no reason. After sitting in the dentist office for 1 hour we went to our doctor's appointment. We waited in the waiting room for quite a while and the doctor came in. I voiced my concerns that probably nothing was wrong and then we watched her walk. She did fine until she was asked to walk on her toes and she couldn't. We took her to get an x-ray. When he looked at the X-ray he at first thought it was fine and then saw the three small breaks on her three smallest toe bones down in the foot. Everyone was surprised that it was broken when she was so easily walking on it. The doctor didn't splint it but just referred her to the specialist for Thursday.

Thursday we went to the ortho doctor. It was a nightmare. We waited for 3 1/2 hours to get her cast. They tried to find a boot small enough for her so she didn't need a cast but there were no boots that small. We were the last ones out of the office. The only consolation was that they cut the cast right after putting it on so that we can take it off when we are done. They did this so that we don't have to pay for the cast to be removed since our insurance ended on Thursday. It was the only nice thing about it.

Ashling is now running with her cast on. She still has not let it slow her down. Her only complaint is that the cast is sweaty.

status

It's been two weeks since Cameron was unemployed. I thought I would write a little about it. Cameron has applied for quite a few jobs and each day we try and find more jobs to apply for on-line. We have learned though that it is the worst way to look for jobs. I guess the only good way to find a job in this economy is through networking. So If you know anyone looking for a civil engineer with four years experience please refer Cameron to them.

He has been told he is over-qualified as well as under-qualified. Several people have told him they wished they could hire him. He has applied for government as well as private jobs. He has applied for jobs doing exactly what he was doing as well as other jobs that are very different from what he was doing.

We learned that one job Cameron applied for had 375 applicants. That means there are at least 375 engineers looking for work in the inland empire. That is crazy! We are looking for work anywhere in the west and have even thought about moving to New Zealand where there is a demand for civil engineers after the big earthquake.

We still have not received any word for the unemployment office. We are assuming we will get unemployment but I guess we will see. I guess that is another reason for having savings since it takes quite a few weeks for unemployment to kick in especially in California.

Cameron has managed to keep himself very busy applying for jobs and doing lots of service projects and other projects for friends and family. Hopefully sometime soon someone will want to hire him.

The Meadow

We went hiking today. It goes like this... I ask Annika if she wants to go on a walk. She says, "shoes, walk, raera." She wants us to know what she needs for the walk and in what order. Annika is very insistent that we don't forget Sierra if we are going for a walk. She enjoys getting into the backpack carrier and wants to make sure she has her "pa fa." She jabbered non-stop the entire time. I am not sure what she said but she kept saying it over and over again. She was concerned if I ever got more than 15 feet away and then would say, "ma ma". (I am not carrying a backpack so I get to feel cool sometimes and take more of a lead over Cameron. I am also sure that in a few more hikes Cameron will be used to it and then he will out pace me like he usually does.)

We hiked up hill towards the "Little Green Valley." We were completely unsure of what this might be but there was a trail head and so we decided to try it out. We weren't even sure we would make it to the destination. I like to get a workout in the morning but I don't want it to take all day. I usually give it half an hour up or so and then allow the rest for making it back down. I really enjoyed this trail because the path was steep but doable and I could keep up my quick pace I use when I know we will only be going up for a half hour.

After a while we started hiking into the burn area from the 2007 fire. I was disappointed to see the trees disappear and hike through the ugly burned and cut down logs where the trail was mixed with too much ash. I don't like to go through those areas.

We were out of it sooner than I expected though and right when I was sure we had taken the wrong trail. The sign did not seem to offer confidence as to which way we should go. The meadow was amazing. I have never seen something like this in our mountains. I am pretty sure every part of it burned during the fire because there were marks of fire all around it. Even in areas not burned by fire, everything right now is dry and yellow. There hasn't been rain in about 4 months. But this meadow was completely green. The grass was very vibrant and about three feet long. It was so long it was falling all over itself. The meadow was almost at the top of the hills and there wasn't anything else above the meadow. We were mystified as to where the water source was from the meadow. We still are.

I like hiking each morning. It is a little peace from the outside world.

Laid Off

I remember posting last fall in October about the depression and things feeling bad. We managed to get by that hard time with some conservation and getting rid of some things. The past year hasn't been so bad. I didn't buy the kids school clothes for the first year ever but I managed to buy some new shoes for each one. I didn't buy a new bike for Ashling even though she needs one but I managed to talk the guy at the thrift store down to 6 dollars for a used one. We still haven't bought new tubes for it but hopefully we will soon. I learned to turn off the lights as I walked around the house. My electric bill went down a lot just for that. In fact on Wednesday I was looking forward to our paycheck because I knew how to spend the money and with my babysitting job I thought maybe I would go shopping for some winter clothes for the girls.

Cameron came home that night with the news that he is no longer employed at Webb.

I guess the Depression is not over. He had about 10 applications out already after the few slow weeks of work. He filled out about 10 more applications on Thursday and Friday. Only 2 are in our area... the rest are throughout the west. The worst part of the Depression is this... even with all those applications out we don't know if we will get a job. Even with all the applications he may find we don't know if he will find a job.

We have a lot of decisions to make... should we move away from our house... even without a job. Should we stay in our house and raid our 401K? It is hard to know what to do when you don't know how long to be prepared for.