We've had better weeks.

     This week has been full of sleepless night due to a nagging cough, a washer that decided to flood our kitchen and news that we were harboring criminals.

    I certainly wouldn't say this was the worst week of my life, but I've had much better ones.  It started out good with Sunday being my first week in the primary. I enjoy the cute kids and singing the primary songs; but I must admit the most enjoyable part was hearing the screams and fussing sounds of a certain little girl in the halls and not having to be the one wresting her.  Ellie and church have never mixed very well. In Heber, Jake taught the young men so I was left each week to walk the halls and fight the fight.  Knowing that Jake gets to experience the next five months of managing her until she can go to nursery puts sunshine in my soul. Ha Ha.

   Monday brought a not so fun surprise when we received word from Jake's mom that the wonderful people  we had found to rent our home in Heber were all over the news. A quick Internet search left me shocked as I found mug shots and lengthy reports of fraud.  I was stunned as I read the convicted and alleged misdeeds. It seemed surreal. We had felt so good about these people when we interviewed them about renting our home, and here they were on national news for scamming people out of large sums of money.  It is a strange feeling realizing that you have been conned.  It was scary to think that we could be stuck in a long eviction process with people whom were far from trustworthy 2000 miles away.  We felt like we had no control of the situation.

    Fortunately they moved out on their own. Even though I don't think we will ever see the rent they owe us, and now we have to pay a management company to rent our house, I really feel like this has been a good experience.  We have had so many friends and family go out of their way to help us through this.  What a blessing and comfort it is to have good people in your life.  In truth I feel really sorry for our renters.  The life they are living with all the deceit must be so full of pain and stress. I'm so thankful for the blessing of having a good honest husband, and for having a life that is governed by integrity. I'm so happy for the life that we have.

   Our week has been pretty dominated by the infamous renters, but we did take some time on Saturday to get out and go to Whipple Dam.  Its a tiny little lake that has sandy beaches and shallow swimming areas. We built sand castles and played in the water.  We hadn't expected it to be warm enough for swimming so we were unprepared without swim suits.  The kids didn't mind a bit. It was a beautiful warm day and we all had such a great time.  I would bet that many more days will be spent there.

Hudson spotted some small fish in the water. He was excited and scared at the same time.



 

We could not keep our little water bug out of the water.  She is such a little fish.   





I loved building sand castles. Hudson loved destroying them.









Ellie wore her first piggy tails this week. I was pretty excited that her hair was finally long enough!

As a side note, I have had an unrelenting cough for the last few weeks. I don’t feel terribly sick and I wouldn’t mind it so much except for the fact that it keeps me from sleeping. I have tried all sorts of night time cough medicines and sleep aides and nothing seems to help. One night, well early morning, just as I had finally been able to slip into sleep, I awoke to the sounds of Hudson crying and vomiting. He managed to cover every piece of bedding and his self. Jake bathed Hudson while I changed his bed. We tucked him back into bed and I began the long chore of once again trying to fall asleep. A few hours later just as sleep was once setting in, we awoke to the same unpleasant noise. Again he managed to soak every article of bedding possible.


The next day I began the task of laundering the enormous amount of soiled pillows and bedding. We played trains in Hudson’s room while the first load was running in the washer. After quite a while I went in to change the load thinking it was done. What I found was water pouring out all over my kitchen floor. Judging by the amount of water, it must have been running for a long time. I used every towel we brought to try and get the water mess under control. It was such a mess. Thankfully my awesome husband was able to fix the washer the next day.