A New Baby, A New Job, and a New House
What a tremendous week! My heart is overflowing with all the blessings that have been given to us recently. I know that our Father in Heaven loves us all unconditionally, and that sometimes He blesses us when we are deserving and sometimes He blesses us even when we're not. Either way, He knows what we need when we need it most. He is good, He is kind, He is merciful, and He is so very generous!!
After close to 12 hours of labor, our sweet little grandson Jack Alvin Harmon was born on Tuesday, April 6th. We are so grateful that he arrived safely, and that his mother, Hannah, was in such good hands at the hospital down in Provo, Utah.
Amber and I got burritos for lunch in his honor, and even made a toast to him that we shared in our family group text. 💗 Sweeto Burrito 💗
It took them a whole day to decide on Jack Alvin, instead of the frontrunner name of Maxwell that they had previously put at the top of the list. They just didn't think he looked like a Maxwell.
They chose the middle name of Alvin in honor of my great grandfather, William Alvin Snider. How sweet to choose a family name! I dug up a couple of cute stories about him to share in our family group text.
Jack was 7 lbs. and 5 oz., and a mere 18.5 inches long. Scott commented, "That will be tough to make the NBA." :)
Hannah had a hard time near the end of the labor and delivery, but thankfully she was in a hospital where trained staff could take good care of her! She got a fever of 101 because of the epidural, which led to the shakes and some nausea. And her placenta didn't want to come out. The doctor had to go in and get it, which was very painful. They are sending it off to the lab for testing to make sure it's not "placenta accreta". If it is, that could lead to some serious problems down the road! We're praying and crossing our fingers that it will all be okay.
Also, after some feeding hurdles and issues, he is now eating very well. They stayed a second night at the hospital and arrived home on Thursday.
Video in the hospital: (31 seconds)
https://photos.app.goo.gl/CcfZXcrGE9Tj4E826
His hair looks so touchably soft!!
Video on his first day home: (16 seconds)
Jacob burping him
Jack also had a little bit of jaundice, so for 2 days he would sleep with the hospital-issued UV lights hooked up in his bassinette at home.
Jacob said that as soon as they would put the protective eye mask on him, he would be lights out! What a sweetie!
I took a snippet of one of the videos and did a screenshot while I watched little Jack. Then I saved it to use as my home screen on my cell phone! 💗
We are hoping to be able to go down and see him in person and hold him soon. We are waiting for a green light from Jacob and Hannah, who are trying to be very cautious because of COVID-19. Scott is fully vaccinated, and I am halfway there. We are diligent about wearing masks and using hand sanitizer. But we will wait until they invite us down. And we'll just wait by our phones for any and all photos and videos of Jack in the meantime!! :)
In other news . . .
On the same day that Jack was preparing to enter the world, Benson was traveling to Greece on the other side of the world. He arrived safely and gave us a little video tour of the place where he's staying near Athens. He has this entire place to himself!!
And here are a couple more photos of the resort where he is. He's working swing shifts, making sure that the F-16 jet engines are properly taken care of during all the training exercises.
Weston, Amber's husband, has been offered a job in Shreveport, Louisiana, where he has been finishing up his last externship!! His boss, Dr. Larson, has been trying to keep up with the demand for optometrists in the huge Shreveport area, and has been expanding his practice. There are only a couple of optometrists in the area, including into the far away tiny rural towns over the border into Texas. Some of Dr. Larson's patients are driving an hour just to be seen at his office! He is currently building a new practice in Carthage, Texas and is planning to expand into Bossier City (pronounced Boh-zhier City) at some point as well.
It is likely that Weston will bounce around a bit at some point, working a couple days per week in one location, and a couple days in one of the others. But for now, he will primarily work in the Shreveport office. The company is also doing so well right now that Dr. Larson is paying for his employees to go on a company cruise this fall! How fun!
The girls decided to have a "picnic lunch" by the back door. Slurping up those ramen noodles. :)
It is remarkable to look back and see all the steps that have led Weston and his family to this point. He never even had Shreveport on his radar until some of the other externships fell through and failed. That is an important life lesson: Even though there are setbacks and supposed failures, God is in the details of our lives and is blessing us, even though it may not seem like it at the time. :)
Here is a super cute video of Gwen and Abby from this week: (22 seconds)
And the New House . . .
Amber and Weston have also been doing some serious house hunting for several days. After learning that they can do a Physician's Loan, which gives them a little more leeway, they adjusted their search parameters and finally found the house of their dreams!
https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/149-Timberline-Cir-Stonewall-LA-71078/106035497_zpid/
Tuesday: We woke up to SNOW!!! Several inches in fact!! That's spring time in Idaho, people.
They made an offer through their realtor in Louisiana, did some counteroffering, and now they are "under contract". I still don't know exactly what that means . . . But they are now on a timeline and have an approximate closing date (May 10th). They are relieved to have found a place to land and put down some roots as a family. SO EXCITING!!!
Other happenings this week . . .
Monday: I finally got to talk to Benson after a long time of trying to get our schedules lined up. He was busy packing to head to Greece the following morning, but he let me "hang out" with him while he gathered up his last items.
And Kylie, with her amazing reputation as the animal foster care lady for the base, took in an abandoned 2 day old kitten that a friend brought over. Her hope was that the new mommy cat would take in the estranged kitten with her own 4 babies and nurse it back to health. And she did!! What a kind mommy cat!
Left to right: Bowen (her oldest brother), Bowen's girlfriend, Kelvin (her youngest brother), Chelsea and Garret
*Yes, her adoptive mom is a HARMON! We thought that was pretty remarkable when we first connected back in 2017. We even figured out the family relationship. Paula comes down through Alpheus Cutler Harmon, who I think was a brother to Appleton Milo Harmon. (or his uncle).
Friday: I worked out in the yard ALL DAY. The weather was around 50 degrees, but it was sunny, which made it feel much warmer. I did wear a hoodie all day, though. I raked up some debris in the front yard and side yards and bagged it up.
Then I fertilized all the lawns. And I even cleared out the strawberry bed!
It went from this:
It always feels so good to get things unburied from winter debris and get it all freshened up. Getting all that work done felt pretty great!
Saturday: The wind blew. And blew. And blew. The high wind warning said the winds would be 25-35 mph continuously, with gusts up to 60 and even 70 mph!! Yikes! So we stayed indoors all day, except for a quick trip to the grocery store.
Meanwhile, Scott got up at 3:00 a.m. to catch a bus to Boise from Idaho Falls that was leaving at 4:00 a.m. Gross! Nobody should be doing anything but sleeping at that hour of the night. In the past, they rode on a chartered bus to Boise to get all their checkups and physicals. But not this time. They rode on a SCHOOL BUS. Ugh. Slow, loud, and uncomfortable. All the way to Boise and back. And all in the same day! Poor guy.
He went to bed early last night and slept great! And today (Sunday) he just had to go to Pocatello again and then back.
After Gwen's talk, and after the children enjoyed singing time, I gave a short presentation, filling in for Scott who is a primary teacher but couldn't be there to do it himself.
They talk to him some more.
Sunday: Gwen gave her first talk in Primary at church. She did awesome! She wasn't scared at all! Some 3 year olds cower behind their parent up at the podium and refuse to say anything at all. But not Gwen. She repeated everything Amber had written for her and practiced with her like a champ!!
I sat in the back of the room and snuck in a couple photos. Like any cool Grandma would.
I told them I had a very special message for them and had them listen to discern what I was trying to say. Then I said, "I love being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" with my mouth closed. After a few failed attempts to guess, but one boy got close, I read them a scripture out of the Come Follow Me lesson for this week. Doctrine and Covenants 30:5 says: "open your mouth to declare my gospel."
So I opened my mouth and tried sharing the message once again. This time they all got it. :)
Then I told them briefly how, in my travels last year on the East Coast, I sometimes stayed with people who had questions about what I believed. In one location down in Georgia, I was "grilled" for 4 hours about my beliefs and why I believe what I believe. I felt very uncomfortable and even left their house in tears because they made me feel like what I believe is dumb and wrong.
A couple weeks later, I had a similar experience up in Virginia. It turned out that the AirBnb where I was staying belonged to a Baptist minister and his wife. He asked me one evening about my religious beliefs. It turned into a lengthy 2 hour Q&A session, where again, I was made to feel bad for what I believe.
At this point, I paused in my story for a minute. I sat on a little chair and asked them if anyone had ever tried roller skating before. Several hands went up. I pulled my pair of skates out from a bag and started putting them on. I talked with them about whether they had ever fallen down while learning to skate, or ride a bike, etc. I stood up and skated around in a small circle on the carpet, and then pointed out that sometimes when we try to do good things, such as sharing the gospel, sometimes we fall down. I carefully "fell" down onto the floor. I told them that when those people made me feel bad for what I believe, I didn't know if I could get back up and do it again.
Then I shared the next scripture with them (while still sitting on the floor). Doctrine and Covenants 30:11. "Yea, you shall ever open your mouth in my cause, not fearing what man can do, for I am with you."
I told them how the very next day, after my conversation with the minister in VA, I was touring the oldest church in America. A lady working there asked me where I was from. (Idaho) She wanted to know what I was doing so far away from home, so I told her I was doing family history up and down the east coast. She replied, "Well that's interesting. I have a friend who is learning about her ancestors from some Mormons. I don't know what what the fascination is with those Mormons and why they do so much family history, but she sure is learning a lot."
While she was speaking, I kept hearing the Holy Ghost tell me over and over, gently but firmly, "Open your mouth. Open your mouth. Don't be afraid. Just open your mouth." So I finally did. I told her, "Actually, I'm a Mormon, though that's just a nickname. The name of our church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And the reason why we do so much family history work is because family means everything to us. We are all part of God's family and family means everything to Him. We want to know our people and to feel connected to them." She was duly impressed and even apologized to me, worried that she had offended me. But I was not offended in the least. And that was that.
I got up off the floor and summed it all up again for the children. God gives us commandments, such as sharing his gospel. He will help us by being right there with us. We might fall or even fail at times. But we can get back up again and try again with his loving help.
We then sang the chorus of Nephi's Courage:
I will go, I will do the things the Lord commands.
I know the Lord provides a way, He wants me to obey.
I will go, I will do the things the Lord commands.
I know the Lord provides a way, He wants me to obey.
They loved it. And I think they especially loved seeing me get up on roller skates, ha ha. Children are the best.
Speaking of which, I just got off a short video chat with Jake and Hannah and Jack. They called so I could watch the process of waking Jack up to eat. He's an excellent sleeper, so it takes quite a bit of doing to get him awake enough to eat properly. They talk to him, and rub his tummy.
They undress him.
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