Busy busy

Oh dear. Once again it’s been two weeks since I last wrote. I hope I’m not creating a habit here.

On Monday the 16^th I officially signed up for Medicare. I got my card yesterday and on the first of May I will be eligible. I haven’t needed a doctor for a while… and I hope that continues. When I do, I’ll have to learn to navigate this system.

That week was just an amazingly crazy week. We came back from Jonathan’s and I had TONS of stuff I needed to catch up on and do. One of the major ones was that I had a Clayton Makepeace webinar on Monday. I’m going to his pricy Financial Intensive in May and I’d turned in homework for him to review. I was pleased that he liked my ideas. I now have to work on it more… but it’s been nearly two weeks and I have not touched it again.

I had some work for Newsmax I was doing with some pretty short deadlines—like 48 hours. It was the first time I’d done this kind of email, but after one revision, she thought it was great.

I had agreed to sing at our ward’s Visiting Teaching convention on Thursday. They should have been simple songs, but the harmony was a bit odd. So we practiced Sunday, Tuesday and then Thursday before the program. And I practiced some at home as well. It was lovely haunting music and I think the program went well. I had invited two people to go with me and they both said they would. I was trying to figure out how I could take them and still practice. But then they both dropped out. I was sad. But it made it easier to go to the practice.

I have been working on a book on customer retention and renewals for continuity programs—especially financial newsletters. I’d like to have it finished, printed and ready to take when I go to the financial intensive in May. So I’ve been finishing it. Tom has been great to proof read it for me. This week I finally got it mostly formatted and if I can get the cover finished, I think it may be able to go to the printer (create space print on demand) on Monday. I will be glad to have it done… but even published is not done. When I get the first copy, I’ll find all the mistakes I didn’t track done in the many revisions I’ve already done.

I bought a book layout that I thought would make things very simple. But since I’ve spent about 16 hours putting the book into the format and working on the cover layout, I don’t think it’s very simple at all. It does look lovely, though.

For our Women’s retreat, we are making fabric covered journals for each sister (200). We want to give her a chance to record the miracles, blessings and tender mercies that come into her life each day. I’ve been cutting out fabric—using scraps that I have. A sister gave me some of her scraps, too. Then on Tuesday of this week, three of us got together and pasted. Ugh. I think we did about 60 in two hours. They each took about 18 home to finish. I finished my 18. And my poor secretary has nearly 100 to do.

Saturday, Tom was trying out his new tractor and took a load of dirt and rocks over to Ernie’s house to put in a big dip in his driveway. He decided to come around from the side to dump it. Unfortunately, he forgot there is a swale or a seasonal bog there and got the tractor well stuck in the mud. We tried to pull it out with the truck, but no luck. And they were predicting more rain. So I called a neighbor and he came over with his little tractor. But he had a longer chain, so he was mostly on the drive and with some tire spinning, he was able to pull Tom’s big tractor out. It was a little exciting!

 Lilac's blooming and fountain flowing.

We have been having rain and our tulips and phlox have been magnificent. We planted the garden and have little heads of broccoli now. Our asparagus is growing and we are feasting on that. But our little sugar snap peas are only an inch or so tall. If the weather gets hot, we may not have any of them. Still, it’s fun to get the garden started again.

Last Sunday we had a ward conference in Houston. It’s about 2 hours north east of us. I ended up being gone over 12 hours that day. The day started with training at 8:30 am. Then I taught the lesson in Relief Society. It was on a great topic—the blessing of the Word of God. After church we were to have lunch and go visiting. But the visitee’s fell through so we just chatted. Then at 3pm we had Stake Council. It’s always interesting.

This week was a little less hectic. I continued work on the journals and the book project. I got a quick assignment from Newsmax and I need to work on my HVAC newsletter. I have the article ideas approved. I also got the article outline approved for my 1/month executive coach article and got that written.

I’ve been trying to work on my family history—going back on the Donop line. I found where two sisters—Pauline and Antoniette (sisters to Franz Anton) married two brothers—Otto and Joachim Roder. When I was given options of “is this the same person?” on Family Search, they seemed to connect into to a Roeder family with lots of children, two of whom married Pauline and Antoniette Donop. But the marriage dates are different… and Pauline is married to a different brother. So I think they ARE connected… I just need to straighten out the pieces.

Thursday and Friday Tom and I went to St. Louis to the temple. It was a nice trip. We took some of the Donop family names and were able to do 6 endowments and about the same number of sealings.

Saturday Tom had a primary activity where the bishopric went to breakfast with the primary children and then played church jeopardy. Tom’s team won. The primary presidency was pleased with what the children knew. The questions were all taken from Primary sharing times for the past 18 months. And the children knew most all the answers.

Cute story: Pam’s autistic great-grandson has just been going to church for perhaps the past 6 months. He was riding the bus home from school. One kid said, “I’m the Avenger!”  Another kid said, “I’m Iron Man!”  Her grandson pipes up, “I’m the Prophet Moses!”

After the activity, Tom joined other men helping to put in 150’ of fence line for one of our members who was just diagnosed with terminal cancer. He had just built a new house and needed this part fenced off as part of an easement agreement. I’m glad they were able to put his mind at rest on this point at least.

We had great Sacrament talks today. Really, good lessons all around. Now I need to finish letters to missionaries, finalize plans for our RS Women’s Retreat, and visit with family!