Continuing my birthday...

Continuing with my birthday gifts...yesterday, I enjoyed two more...

First, Micah took me to get a pedicure. It was also his first ever pedicure. He was a bit overwhelmed by choosing a color, particularly enjoyed the massage chairs, and enjoyed the sugar scrub that smelled of coffee. He's a bit sad about having his calluses sloughed off, though, as he rather likes/needs them for climbing and taekwondo, lol. 

We had a great time and I thoroughly enjoyed sharing the experience with him!

After that, I met up with Lynne for happy hour to celebrate my birthday. We both tried one of their happy hour cocktails, enjoyed some eats, and had a lovely visit.

It was a terrific start to the week...so very grateful for gifts of experiences!

Thankful Thursday

Almost half way into June now...let me start by saying a great big thank you to all who wished me a happy birthday last week! As I'm now in my last year before the big 5-0, I'm so incredibly thankful...

1. For a shift in mindset. I realize that some may dread milestone birthdays but I find that I'm looking forward to mine next year. As I'm getting older and wiser, I realize more than ever that this life is a privilege, and I'm so grateful to be here. I'm finding myself less concerned about what others think and just continually thankful for this life I've created.

There have definitely been years where I've been down on myself about weight or appearance or whatever...I think we've all had those moments. Lately, though, I find that I'm genuinely more comfortable with myself and can focus on the progress and the positives. I can be glad for sore muscles because it means I'm working them. I can be proud of my climbing even when the routes aren't the more difficult ones because, hey, at least I'm climbing them.

Given all of that, I snapped this photo after boot camp on my birthday. I think I'm doing pretty well for 49. :) 

2. For beautiful peonies & other flowers. My peonies finally bloomed for my birthday! One of my three bushes really out-does itself every year (top left)...one seems to be comprised of different varieties, though I've had this plant for I think 10 years and it's not done this before (top right)...and one doesn't appear ready to bloom quite yet (apparently I may need to re-plant it less deep) (not pictured). I love peonies. They remind me of my childhood--we always had some growing around the yard and would cut them and make bouquets for Memorial Day visits to the cemetery.

Just after my birthday, I cut a bunch of the peonies that were falling over and made this very full bouquet (bottom left). (Turns out, it was a good thing I cut them when I did, as the skies opened up just after that, lol.) Next year, I must be more attentive and make bouquets sooner. :)

And the bottom right photo is of my monthly arrangement gifted to me by Nathan's parents for my birthday. I love that the flowers are locally sourced when possible and that the shop is woman founded, owned & operated. One of my local friends even grows some of the flowers for this shop!

3. For Percy Jackson. Back when we homeschooled, the Percy Jackson series was one of our favorites. After we finished reading that first series, we read pretty much everything else that Rick Riordan wrote. I loved the laughter and sharing that came from reading those together (sometimes altogether, aloud, and sometimes on our own and then talking about them). 

Recently, Asher started re-reading the books to fill some of his summer downtime. I love that. He's already finished twelve or thirteen of Riordan's books. (He's researched the best order to read the books and has a plan.) I'm also re-reading the books, but we agreed that I had to wait until he was well on his way through the books so that we wouldn't be fighting over a book, lol. I'm now on book three.

For my birthday, Asher got the two of us tickets to a Percy Jackson musical down in Denver at the Aurora Fox Arts Center. The seven person cast was simply amazing and we had a thoroughly good time! (Truly, the innovation and talent was fabulous!) To make it an even more enjoyable experience, we also got lunch and dessert at the Stanley Marketplace before the show and stopped at Buc-ee's for a snack on the way home. (Asher hadn't been to Buc-ee's yet, lol.)

4. For game nights. So, we've been doing weekly family nights this summer while all three boys are home right now. Sometimes we watch a movie; sometimes we play some games. For my birthday, Noah got me a new game...7Wonders. We've been having a lot of fun learning and playing it! I'm ever thankful that we enjoy playing games together and for the time together that it creates. (Noah also got me some lovely rum...and I'm thankful for having sons old enough to buy me alcohol, lol.)

5. For interesting neighbors. Earlier this week, I unintentionally spent almost three hours visiting with my neighbors. :) I'd gone over to ask a quick question and ended up having a great time and sharing some fascinating stories. (Seriously, there were so many stories! I learned heaps.) I'm so thankful for wonderful neighbors and for having the time to just visit with them. 

Okay, that's enough for now. I don't know about you, but it was pretty hot here today (high of 95 degrees)...which also makes me thankful for air conditioning. :) Here's hoping you're enjoying your summer so far!

(PS There will be more on my birthday gifts from Micah and Nathan later...after they happen.)

Welcome June!

So happy to welcome June! Let's just say that May was a long month for us. So, on Sunday, Noah, Asher, Nathan and I celebrated surviving that by setting aside the day to just hang together...

We started with lunch at Otto Pint (very close to home) then headed to MeadKrieger in Loveland to taste mead. None of us had tried mead before so we just shared a few flights of most of their house meads. We were impressed by the variety and had some that we really liked and some that we didn't. :) 

From there we stopped at Jax for a bit before heading home for some downtime...then dinner...then a movie together (though we won't be letting Noah pick the movie for awhile now, lol).

It wasn't overly exciting but it was a much needed day. And now we're looking forward to a new month!

Thankful Thursday on Tuesday

May has been a very long month. And it's not even over yet. ;P I know I'm behind on my Thankful Thursday posts--and I have a minute now--so here are some of the things I've been thankful for this month...

1. New things hanging on the wall. Nathan got me this awhile back and we finally updated it and hung it a couple weekends ago...

Technically, Nathan's been to one or two more but we only scratched off parks we've been to together. We've got some work to do, lol. It's nice to have the reminder hanging where we can see it regularly, and we're looking forward to making more progress on the list. 

Also on our walls...we try to pick up a magnet during our travels (has to be a place we've been to personally)...

As you can see, though, our shadow boxes were full. Obviously, this is great...it means we've done some good traveling! The downside was that at this point I couldn't find a matching shadow box and we had no room to add another one near these others anyhow. Given all that, we decided not to worry about matching exactly and to just start a new area...

So thankful for our many travels!

2. Science. At his last appointment with his rheumatologist (May 10), Micah opted to participate in a research study he qualified for and is excited to contribute to science. It's a study to evaluate TNFi therapies (the types of medications Micah's been on for his arthritis) for juvenile arthritis patients. They're trying to see whether the medications are being over-prescribed so randomly assign participants to either continue on their meds as normal, taper the meds (spread them out further--so, in Micah's case, have infusions every 6 weeks instead of every 4 weeks), or stop the meds altogether. 

Micah had been planning to try the 6 week intervals over the summer anyhow. In the randomization, he ended up assigned to the group stopping all meds (which he was pretty happy about). Soooo. We've canceled his infusion appointments (should have had one May 18th on the previous schedule) and accompanying meds. He'll need to see the rheumatologist every 3 months now instead of every 6 months but that seems preferable to infusions every month. If he starts having flare ups, he'll just go back on the infusions and that result will be logged for the study. Now we wait. 

Thankful, as always, for the fabulous doctors and opportunities at Children's.

3. Nathan's work trip. Nathan was in San Francisco again earlier this month, this time for work (instead of collegiate taekwondo). Thankful that he was able to have the face-to-face time with some of his co-workers and that things here were fairly uneventful in his absence.

4. That Asher was the one sitting in the chair. A couple of weekends ago, quite unexpectedly, Asher's chair suddenly gave out. The welds on the bottom and the attachment to the chair, itself, just failed. One minute he was just sitting at the table, and the next he was on the floor. Fortunately, he was mostly just surprised and is unhurt. 

Because we'd repaired the seat portion of one of the other chairs previously, we happened to have an extra set of the chair feet hardware. Nathan fixed the attachment point and replaced the hardware and claims that the chair is good to go now...

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little worried now about all of the chairs, lol. I may be keeping my eye out for new kitchen chairs. ;) In the meantime, though, I'm very thankful that it was Asher sitting in the chair when it failed, as I'm not sure the rest of us would have come away uninjured. 

5. A little help from my friends. This past weekend has reminded me how very appreciative I am to have the wonderful friends that I do. I won't get into specifics but huge shout out to Lynne, Deanna, Sarah & Molly along with my baby sisters...love you all! 

Also, enormous thanks to Michelle for placing some peonies at my dad's grave yesterday for me and my mom. (Mom was here for my niece's graduation and spent some time both here in Fort Collins with us and down in Longmont with my brother and his family.) 

So blessed to have friends still in Prosser who can help out with things like this at a moment's notice. 

Okay, that's what I've got for now. :)

Summer break is here

So, summer break officially started here last week. Last Tuesday, I moved Micah home from the dorms at CU. Despite his migraine issues (which thankfully appear to be done now that he's home), he finished the semester strong. He did not, though, do any packing before I showed up, lol...

Unlike with Asher, an evening check out time was not an option, so I was the only one available to go move Micah. (Asher resumed his YMCA after school job till the end of that school district's academic year so was also not available.) We got some lunch then started on the packing. Fortunately, Micah had a great number of varying bags to pack things into and the dorm had wheeled carts available that we could load up with stuff and push to the van. It took us just under three hours but we got everything packed up, loaded out and cleaned. Very thankful for those carts and for still having a mini-van (that currently only has one of the middle captain's chairs in it to create more cargo space in the main cabin). I don't think we could have fit everything otherwise, lol.  

Incidentally, Micah had a lot of stuff. Whoa. I really didn't think it would be so much. We moved him down there with just one mini-van load and he hadn't had a car all year to bring more back with him. Except that he did, lol. It seems that on infusion weekends he took back a bag here and a bag there. He ended up with a lot of bags...of sparring gear, climbing gear, extra gear, etc. But. We got it all in the van. Whew, all good. :) 

And, when we got home, Nathan and Noah were ready and waiting to help unload everything...yay! The front room got full again...

The first picture is after Asher's unload and the second one is after Micah's. Yup, very thankful that our front room is usually mostly empty so that there's room to pile stuff temporarily.

After unloading Micah and once Asher got home from work, we had dinner and then enjoyed some family game time. We had a great time with some CodeNames and then Noah found an online game of connecting two actors through their movies and other actors. Noah, Micah and I had a lot of fun with that one. :)

Since then, we've had conversations about summer expectations...Micah's been down to Children's (that'll be for another post)...Asher and Noah have been working...friends have been hung out with...Micah's managed to put away and/or store everything so that the front room is empty again...and plenty of other tasks and paperwork and such have been tackled. And now we're settling into our summer and adjusting to how to live altogether again. Whew.