Several of us have been sick throughout this past week, but I guess I won the prize for being sick the longest. I'm on Day 5 now, even though I do feel a bit better today finally. Scott is the only one that hasn't been sick at all, bless his heart. :)
Monday: I started working again at the Election Office (where I used to work a few years ago). I'll be helping out just until the upcoming November election is complete.
This is me with my former co-worker, Betsy Barrus, as we stuff absentee ballots during the day.
Monday, we prepared about 1500 ballots to be mailed out, but then there was an accounting glitch so we had to slow things down for Tuesday to double check everything. We got it all figured out, thankfully, and then it was back to stuffing ballots.
My job was one part of a 3-man (or 3-lady) team. Karen, down at the end, would place the mailing labels on the envelopes, then pass them to Betsy in the middle. Betsy would put in the ballot and instructions, along with an "I Voted" sticker, then pass everything to me. I was the double-checker. My job was to double check that everything was inside as it should be, and that everything was correct as far as the right ballot going to the right voter in the right legislative district.
I didn't know that I was going to be doing things at such a rapid pace all day long, and that words would start to blur before my eyes. So I texted Amber and had her bring me my glasses. It helped tremendously!!
It was a fun day, though, especially working with Betsy. She and I were close friends when we used to work together, and have stayed friends since, even though we don't get to see each other very often. She is a lot of fun! We like to talk about being a grandma and all the joys and challenges involved. :) (cough-cough - potty training ha ha)
Mid-day, I talked to Kylie over in Italy. She is doing great! She updated me on all the pets, ha ha. The guy that was supposed to adopt Nala, the white kitten, wasn't being very reliable, so she decided to keep Nala for now. She also found homes for all 3 of the bunnies. But the reason she called me on Monday was to show me her NEW bunny!!
She said that someone left this poor baby bunny in a box on the side of the road. So Kylie, in the goodness of her heart, brought the bunny home.
Here she is holding Nala.
And Happy Day! Benson should be home as early as tomorrow (Monday)!!! She is super excited and I'm so happy for her! She made it through more than a month of being by herself without her husband! What a trooper. :)
Kylie also sent me a couple pictures of when she went to Venice with two new friends she's made over in Italy. One of the girls came over to adopt a kitten and they instantly bonded. :) She really enjoyed her weekend visit to Venice. But then, who wouldn't!?! ha ha
After work on Monday, I came home and helped Amber finish making a batch of homemade donuts!! I've never made homemade donuts before, so this was an adventure - and a fun one!
First, let me share the story of how homemade donuts came to mean so much in the Whitworth family. (I'll try to get the details right)
During the years of the Great Depression, Weston's great grandparents, Leonard and Marie Merrill, had to move because of hard times. On their way to living closer to family in Utah, they saw a man on a bicycle selling homemade donuts. They bought some donuts, and they were SO GOOD that they asked the salesman for the recipe.
The man didn't give them any specifics, but he did tell them the list of ingredients. They worked hard to recreate the delicious donuts and to get the proportions correct. Once they did so, they began to sell their own. Grandma Merrill would get up at 4 a.m., after the donuts had been left to rise for several hours, to fry them and prepare them for her husband to sell. Grandpa Merrill would head out on his bicycle and work hard until they had all been sold each day before coming home. And a bonus: The children always had a fresh donut in their lunch every day.
This is Leonard Mouritsen Merrill, with the cart that he built and his rack of donuts.
And that's how they were able to support their family through the hard times during the Depression!! What a story! But it doesn't end there! The Whitworth clan gets together a couple times a year to have a Donut Party. They make the dough, they cut out the shapes and let them rise. They fry them up and glaze them together. Then they eat donuts together and reminisce about their ancestors who were innovative and hard-working during a very difficult time.
Here is the original story on FamilySearch:
https://www.familysearch.org/photos/artifacts/4775298?cid=mem_copy
I just love this story SO MUCH!! I love doing family history, but this takes it a huge step further. This is a way to remember, to connect, to celebrate, and to honor loved ones who have passed on. I want to come up with my own family history traditions in a similar fashion.
*Note: We did try to start a new tradition about 2 years ago. We had what we called, "Honor Our Ancestors" night. We kicked off the new tradition by remembering my great-grandparents, Leon & Christina Miller Jones, who were both deaf from childhood accidents. They are the parents of my 99 year old Grandma Doris Day, my mother's mother. We baked one of their favorite meals with chicken and vegetables, then had vanilla ice cream on special saucers that had artistic pictures on the bottom of the insides. My mother remembered that as a young girl, it was a game to try to guess who had the dish with the little red birdie, or another one of the pictures. Amber also taught us all a song in sign language, "My Heavenly Father Loves Me." We actually took a video of us singing together after dinner. (And Chelsea was there with us, too, visiting our family for the first time.) It was really special. We just haven't put together another "Honor Our Ancestors" night yet. I should probably work on that.
Here is the video of us singing in sign language: (All of us were there, including Benson, Jacob, Amber, Scott's parents, Chelsea, my mom, plus Scott and me.) June 2018
https://photos.app.goo.gl/WTxPJsyV3Jzq59J2A
Anyway, back to me helping Amber . . .
She had already cut out the donuts and let them rise all afternoon while I was at work. Here she is taking a freshly fried donut out of the hot oil and placing it on a rack to cool slightly.
The dough is very soft, but the longer you let it rise, the fatter it gets - which makes a really nice donut!
My job was to transfer the cooled donut over to the other counter and into the red bowl with glaze. I would turn and manipulate the donuts and donut holes until they were covered in the glaze (water, powdered sugar and vanilla). Then I would place them on the rack to "set up". Then I would snitch a few donut holes. ha ha It was easier to justify eating donut holes as opposed to eating an entire donut!!
They were SO GOOD!!!
Tuesday: I went back to work at the Election Office again and worked until 5:00 p.m. I only had a few minutes, once I got home, to change my clothes and eat a few bites before heading off to a Young Women activity.
About 15 of us carpooled across town to the Idaho Falls Temple to help with some gardening tasks on the temple grounds.
This man works on the temple grounds and it was he who gave us instructions on how to plant tulip bulbs in the various planter beds.
The tulip bulbs are all arranged in color groupings, so he asked us to leave them as close to the place where they already sat on top of the dirt, and to not scoot them out of our way if at all possible. He had a bucket of trowels, with plenty for everyone in our group. It didn't take us very long to complete our work in the 5 garden beds that we had been assigned.
He mentioned that there was such an interest in participating, on the part of several youth groups in the area, that he was only able to give us these 5 beds to plant. Still, we planted a couple hundred bulbs, I would estimate. Now we can only wait and be patient until spring to marvel at all the tulips that will be in full bloom at some point.
I was just so grateful to be there that night. It felt peaceful and holy to work in the dirt at the temple.
We were instructed that once we were done working in the middle of the dirt, to please tap as much dirt off as possible before stepping onto the sidewalks. And we also took the time to sweep up as much as dirt as we could, brushing it back into the flower beds.
It felt reverent to treat the temple grounds in such a respectful way. After all, it is the House of the Lord and we shouldn't be reckless and careless by tracking dirt and mud all over the place.
Once we finished our gardening work, we went on a leisurely stroll around the entire temple. The temple is, of course,
mostly closed because of COVID-19. For example, if a couple is getting married, they are allowed to have their sealing in the temple with a handful of close family in attendance. But, for most of us, we have to continue waiting patiently until the temple can be open for other ordinance work and temple sessions.
I really miss the peace and beauty of being in the temple of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. At one point, as I was walking slowly and slightly away from the main group, I felt my eyes sting with tears as I looked longingly up at the temple. Being in the temple has always been such a special and sacred experience for me, and I can't wait to be able to go back inside someday!
The sun was setting over the Snake River across the street. What a beautiful way to end a long day.
I'm in the back row, 2nd from the right.
Wednesday: Well, Tuesday night, in the middle of the night, I woke up and noticed that I had a sore throat. It was stinging and sore, and it felt like my tonsils were even touching. Blech.
I woke up Wednesday morning feeling like garbage, so I called the Election Office and told them I would not be coming in. I spent the entire day in bed. I only got up to use the bathroom or to get a little bite to eat.
Abby had not been feeling well on Tuesday, either. She had a sore throat and her nose was runny. At one point, she even had a fever of 100.5. But she was feeling quite a bit better on Wednesday, so that was good.
Gwen had a runny nose, too, earlier in the week, along with a tummy ache and some diarrhea.
Even Amber was feeling a bit under the weather, but thankfully not as bad as I was. Otherwise, who would have been able to take care of the girls???
Thursday: I got up and was out of bed for a little while in the morning, and then was so worn out that I stayed in bed most of the rest of the day. I watched some shows and rested in the quiet of my room. Bless her heart, Amber made some chicken soup for dinner that was just so perfect. It really hit the spot! My throat still hurt, and my nose was like a faucet. I had almost no energy and my brain was especially tired.
The one thing I accomplished that whole day took place in the morning. I helped Abby and Gwen sort their freshly washed laundry, then fold it all and put it away.
Gwen, wearing her favorite dress.
Later that evening, I hung out briefly on the back patio while the girls played in the yard.
Gwen, enthralled by the new Mulan movie, was showing me how SHE was now Mulan. She climbed up on her little picnic table, and proceeded to do her karate kicks, holding her balance as long as she could on one leg at a time. It was really quite remarkable for a 2 1/2 year old!
I took a short video of her as well:
And that was it for Thursday.
Friday: Amber was asked to bunny-sit for her friend, Lyndsey, for the weekend. Her bunny, Ouli (pronounced ooh-lee) is albino and is also blind. She is very sweet and very soft.
The girls have enjoyed picking some of our abundant kale and then feeding it to Ouli every day. Ouli happily munches it all up.
Ouli sleeps in her kennel out in the garage at night, and then for long stretches during the day, she roams around the back yard. She doesn't roam very much, being blind. Mostly she stays within a small radius of wherever Amber sets her down. She likes kale and carrots. The girls have enjoyed brushing her, too.
I felt well enough to head outside Friday evening to pick a bunch of tomatoes again. That was about it though.
This was a Siamese cherry tomato that I found. :)
Saturday: I felt well enough to get out of bed and brainstorm some bathroom renovation plans with Scott for most of the morning. But then I was wiped out and spent most of the afternoon back in bed. It feels like I'll have a little bit of energy after I've been in bed for several hours, but then, after 30-45 minutes, I start to wane and get pitiful again. I feel woozy and sleepy and deprived of energy. So I usually get back in bed to rest.
After an afternoon in bed, I got up and swept the kitchen and hallway. I was so wiped out that I had to go lie down again.
Last night, Amber and Weston went out to dinner, so Scott and I helped get the girls into bed. While Gwen was settling in, I entertained Abby for 30 minutes or so. She wanted to work on her "Kiwi Co." box that had just arrived. She gets these educational and science-y boxes once a month and they are always a delight.
This month's focus was on angles and kaleidoscopes. We put together one of the 3 projects and then sat back to marvel and experiment with it.
It involved a set of mirrors, that, when placed on the various angles, would make a kaleidoscopic reflection of whatever she had colored on the strips of paper.
She colored some additional designs to experiment with.
And she even had the pleasure of showing it all to Papi before it was time to put it all away.
Then, Abby went down to her reading corner to read her 2 books for the day. She has a goal of reading 100 books before Halloween in order to earn a new Princess Jasmine dress (from the Aladdin movie). She's read over 40 books now and is so good at reading! She puts all the expression into what she's reading, too, with inflections and curiosity, excitement and even fear! I'll try to get a video of her reading this coming week.
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