2021 :: week 14

March 28

This is the only picture we took during our Girl's Weekend, and it is missing Hillary! Carly and Meredith dropped Alicia and I off at the airport for our early afternoon flights. When I got to the check-in kiosk I had trouble getting my boarding pass to print and when I asked a clerk for help he told me, "they don't let you check in more than 24 hours in advance." Turns out I bought the return ticket for Monday! I debated what was the best course of action and decided that getting home ASAP was the best possible option. The kind clerk got me on the last flight of the day to KC and didn't charge me. Carly and Meredith came back to the airport to pick me up and took me to Bobpa's. I spent the afternoon with the Johns and even got a short nap. Unfortunately my flight didn't arrive in KC until 1am, so by the time I got home and into bed I was totally exhausted. The exhaustion was worth it, I had such a great time spending time with the John women. Many thanks to everyone that made this weekend possible. 

 

March 29

Elliott made this cute giraffe headband at school. He frequently arrives home with all sorts of fun projects. There are many reasons I am grateful for preschool teachers, but in this case I am grateful for the crafty things they do with my kids. I like to craft, but I don't really enjoy crafting with my little kids. When teachers do the things I am not good at with my kids it helps me feel less guilty that I don't enjoy it and instead spend time doing things I enjoy more with my kids. It is much easier for me to devote time to reading or playing games with my kids than to do art projects or play with play dough. 

March 30

It is the end of an era in the John house, our noisy fridge has been replaced. When we bought our house in August of 2011 the previous owners told us we were welcome to keep the fridge as they didn't need it where they were moving and it wasn't worth selling. Being that we were moving from an apartment and had no fridge we decided to keep it. Our original plan was to buy a new one in a year or so when we had saved up some more money or when it finally gave out. It has been loud as long as we've had it, but in recent months it has gotten even louder. It is loud enough that people notice. Once Elliott was on a zoom call for his primary class and his teacher asked who had a blender going in the background. We have heard about inventory limitations on fridges and supply chain delays due to Covid, so we decided to bite the bullet and get a new fridge on our own terms. On Tuesday morning the deliverymen brought us our new fridge and took the old fridge away. Our new fridge is so much larger and quieter, I almost can't believe we waited so long to replace the old one. The old one had a lot more character though.

March 31

Elliott has a habit of taking of his shoes in random places and then struggling to find them later. He takes them off at the table and whoever is sweeping finds them later. He takes them off at various places in our yard, in our basement, in the bathroom before he gets into the bath. Wednesday I found them at the foot of the slide while he was on the monkey bars at the other end of the playground! 

April 1

Lauren is playing softball this year and Thursday evening they had their first practice. They decided to call themselves the Bombers, and the name seems apropos. Lauren's practice is at OPC, which is very convenient because Will has practice at the same time at Pawnee Elementary. Our plan is for me to walk with Lauren and the little guys up to the school for her practices while Anthony drives Will to his practices. Elliott and Nicholas had a grand time running around the grounds playing some live-action Pokemon game they've been playing together for the past few weeks. 

April 2

Anthony organized an impromptu Finnish missionary reunion for Good Friday. Apparently there had been some chatter on the Finnish Missionary Facebook group and Anthony decided to make things happen. He had the day off work and it worked for him to moderate the gathering. He reconnected with his mission president and several other people he served with as well as people he knows through their shared affinity for Finland.

April 3

Florida! On Saturday we took a mid-morning flight to Orlando and were on the beach before dinnertime. This trip is a family reunion with the Crane family that had been postponed from summer of 2020. My mom wanted all of her grandkids to visit Cocoa Beach and get to witness a rocket launch before the Staritas move this summer. Looking at this picture of the kids frolicking in the waves with their cousins almost makes me forget the hellish twenty minutes we spent trekking back and forth across the airport with our luggage, bulky car seats and a grumpy toddler as we attempted to find our rental car.