What we've been up to . . .

We've been up to a lot. It has been busy. The kind of busy which is so relentless that I have to stop to take deep breaths now and then so I don't get stressed. I consult my calendar and to-do lists on my phone many times a day to make sure I'm not forgetting something important. It's been so busy that Dan and I have to schedule time to talk to each other. And I have had some things on my list to talk about for the last three weeks - there hasn't been a long enough stretch of time to finish an in-depth conversation, so I haven't tried.  (The good news is that when I have to wait to discuss something I'm unhappy about I usually forget why I was upset in the first place. I seem to have discovered a secret for marital harmony.  ???)

Sometime I want to blog more in depth about some of what has been going on. Sometime I want to do a lot of things, like catch up my digital scrapbooks, write emails to friends, edit home movies, make it to the gym more often, read the pile of books I checked out from the library a month ago, and so much more. But I'll just have to wait. For now, here is a peek into life at the Porters these days . . .

Joseph: wrapping up indoor soccer, beginning baseball, ongoing basketball, new Cub Scout, first Pinewood Derby,  birthday (8 years old!), big birthday party that completely wore out his aged parents, a narrator role in the Three Piggy Opera, constantly playing ball of some sort. 

Aubrey: musical theater/vocal/dance classes 10+ hours a week, Mathletes, a role in Little Women (to be performed in May), plenty of homework, babysitting, birthday (13 years old!), two birthday parties.

Bailey: driving as much as possible (after taking a break for a few months), parties with friends, joined the tennis team, lots of homework, YCL (youth camp leader) meetings for Girls Camp, awesome Faith value project, babysitting.

Brandon: birthday (21 years old!), working hard and sounding very happy in Ukraine, home in 43 days!

Tiffany: driving kids here, there, and everywhere, four book clubs, school volunteering, busy church calling (Relief Society), helping with the stake Life of Christ event, meetings to plan Stake Girls Camp, coordinating the universe. Or maybe it just seems like that.

Dan: early morning Seminary (those three words don't communicate well enough how busy this has been), the busiest he has ever been at work, a new daily workout (Crossfit) which is making him walk like an old man and is helping him "rediscover muscles I haven't met in a decade."

As I write all that, I'm thinking that it doesn't sound all that busy. But it feels busy enough that we are all really looking forward to our upcoming trip to the beaches of Mexico. Woohoo - time to re-acquaint myself with the sun and read my backlog of books!

Joseph's Room

When we moved into our current home 6 1/2 years ago everyone was able to have their own room with the exception of little Joseph, who was only 18 months. His stuff was set up in a tiny sitting room accessed off our master bedroom. The room has french doors which close it off to make a small nursery. It was just big enough for his mattress (on the floor), a small wardrobe for his clothes, and some shelves to house his toys. Seriously - with all that in the room there was nowhere to play or hang out. We thought it was a temporary fix until we figured out a better option. Well, our temporary fix lasted for over six years!  It turns out that you don't need a really big room - just big enough is fine.

But when Brandon left on his mission two years ago, we began the room shuffling. It was time - when I talked about the impending room switch, Joseph's eyes got big and starry and he said, "do you think I would be able to have a bed that is off the floor?"  Uh, yes. I just hope we haven't scarred him too much by making him wait 7 1/2 years to have a real bed on a frame!

It actually took me about a year to tackle the project. I knew it would be a big project.  First step: boxing up all the stuff that Brandon was supposed to box up before he left but didn't.  Yes -  that took us an entire Saturday last summer, and now everything Brandon left home with he left to Ukraine is sitting in plastic bins in the garage. It is not well organized or tidy, but that's what happens when you leave all your precious worldly possessions and important papers to be sorted and stored by others.

Next, I had to paint the ceiling in Brandon's old room/Aubrey's new room (I painted it badly when we moved in and it desperately needed a fix). I really hate painting ceilings. Then we began the process of designing and re-doing the room for Aubrey. I'll show the finished product in another post.

Finally, late last fall we began the process of re-doing Aubrey's old room/Joseph's new room. This included listing and then selling Aubrey's white girly furniture and purchasing new Joseph-appropriate furniture. I thought about this step for awhile because, while Joseph's new room is certainly bigger than the room/closet he slept in for many years, it's still a very small room. So, all the furniture in the room needed to maximize storage and make an efficient use of space.

Joseph and I picked out bedding for his room, and I painted the walls and made the window treatment. That was the extent of my involvement in his room. I am completely okay with him decorating his room the way he wants. He is the boss of his personal space. I think he has done an awesome job making his room his personal sanctuary.

I love this corner of the room. We found a great little corner desk and chair on Overstock and a bookshelf at Ikea. Joseph was really set on hanging a white board and a pegboard above the desk, so we did. 

He added a Spiderman calendar and lots of drawings and pictures that are important to him for various reasons.

Notice the bottom shelf of the desk - it  is the perfect spot for him to store his trophies.

 He printed out all the pictures posted on the pegboard and annotated each picture with an explanation about how it relates to him. It has been fun for me to see the things that are important to him at this moment in time. And he added a mustache to his school picture. Of course.

 A close-up of the Lego figures he got last summer at Legoland at the base of his desk lamp.

We hung a shelf above his bed to house his favorite Lego creations. We might add another one above the dresser, as the Lego creations keep multiplying. He temporarily hung a Lego Pirates poster above the bed, but has now replaced it with the Air Jordan basketball picture he received for his birthday.

He wanted a hook on the wall next to his bed so his robe could be easily accessible.

 A close-up of the important stuff he keeps on his bedside table. In addition to his piggy bank to hold his spending money, he decided to make separate containers for mission money and long term savings. He is not a fan yet of our Porter Kids Ledger System and the Porter Bank, but we're working on it.

 To the right of his dresser he has a hamper and a host of miscellaneous drawings. We also hung the remote control earth and moon he got for Christmas. They are controlled by the remotes on his bedside table.
One side of the bed has two big drawers. The other side has a perfect hiding spot. He has equipped it with photos, toys, a notebook for "awesome stuff", a blanket, and slippers.

 And, last (but definitely not least), the signs he posted on the door of his room. 

 "Danger - the getting in trouble kind! Don't come in!  Joseph's Room!  (technical difficulties)  According to the master of the room Joseph."

 Very, very dangerous.

 And don't forget: "Keep calm and call Batman."

Love Day Dinner through the years

We love our Valentine's Day Dinner - and the menu never varies much. Very kid friendly, heart-shaped, red, or pink food. 

  This year we ate by candlelight..

 The dimmed lights not only set a loving mood, but also disguised the fact that our traditional "Cupid's Love Potion" was a strange shade of orange/green instead of pretty pink. When I reached up to get the raspberry sherbet, someone had pulled a switcheroo and put orange/lime sherbet there instead. And I didn't notice until we were home and mixing it up! It still tasted good - it just looked a little strange.

Joseph set the table and wrote love notes on everyone's napkins.

Dan and I sneaked some "love" gifts and Valentine's Day cards onto each person's plate before the meal began.

Not sure what this look was about.  Sisters . . .

Now, that's better.

The day before Valentine's Day Dan had bought me roses at our local Fred Meyer. It appears he was taken. The roses were dead by the next morning! But, the sentiment and intention was the same and we ignored their droopiness.

Why do I look so tired in this picture and most pictures these days?  Oh yes, that would be the fact that I get up at 5:20! But Dan and Bailey get up even earlier - more like 4:45.

And now, just for fun, I scrounged around and found pictures from past Valentine's Day Dinners. The first year we scrapbooked the event was 2004. I think the tradition may have started earlier, but I can't find scrapbook evidence of this.

(all our kid's birthdays are within a few weeks or months of Valentine's Day, so for the purposes of this walk through time, I am going to round their ages up.)

2004 - Brandon was almost 12, Bailey was 7, Aubrey was 4  Grandma and Grandpa Springer joined us this year.

2005 - Brandon 13, Bailey 8, Aubrey 5 (Joseph was born two weeks later)

2006 - Brandon 14, Bailey 9, Aubrey 6, Joseph 1 (Grandma and Grandpa joined us again. This was our last year in our Utah home - we moved a few months later)

2007 - First year in Washington! Brandon 15, Bailey 10, Aubrey 7, Joseph 2

2008 - Brandon 16, Bailey 11, Aubrey 8, Joseph 3

2009 - Brandon 17, Bailey 12, Aubrey 9, Joseph 4

2010 - Brandon 18, Bailey 13, Aubrey 10, Joseph 5 (Breanne and Christine Yates were visiting us)

2011- Brandon 19 (at BYU), Bailey 14, Aubrey 11, Joseph 6

2012 - Brandon 20 (on a mission), Bailey 15, Aubrey 12, Joseph 7
We broke tradition and didn't hold the dinner! Instead we attended the Broadway production of Beauty and the Beast in Portland.

Packages to Ukraine

Yesterday I stood in line at the post office to send two small packages to Ukraine . . . for the last time! This missionary

is coming home soon!

A month before he gets home is his birthday, so we packed modified flat rate envelope packages (the most economical way to mail internationally) full of treats, American food, birthday cards, and recent pictures of the family.

(By the way, I have learned a lot over the two years about sending packages to Ukraine. First of all, packages are expensive.  But, it's a very worthwhile expense. Second, so far all our packages have arrived safely, despite a corrupt Ukrainian postal system notorious for opening packages and removing items. I'm going to credit the incredible amounts of tape I wrap around every package and the Russian Orthodox religious icon stickers I plaster all over each them. Third, filling out the customs forms is always a pain. The rules have changed constantly. About six months ago our local post office began to require that the forms be filled out online and printed. The website and online forms were completely non-intuitive, but I got pretty good at it after sending Christmas packages. Pictured above, for the birthday packages I mailed this week I had all the forms printed out on self-adhesive sticker paper, cut, and signed.  I also had a separate label on each package with Brandon's address in Russian. But when I went to the post office I was informed that I was supposed to write "UKRAINE" large somewhere on the package as well.  What???  This was like the 8th package I've mailed, and I've never heard that.  Oh, Postal Service, always trying to keep us guessing . . .)

Prior to this, the last packages we sent were for Christmas '12.

We tried to be creative to add some fun, and each item was wrapped and had a scripture reference on the tag.
 
He was supposed to look up the scripture and try to figure out what was inside. There was something to open each day in December. This would have worked well if the packages had arrived in time. As it was, he received the packages just before Christmas, and reportedly opened everything in one day, which is just fine too.

Fitting all the mini packages into our big box was a challenge. I had to call in the big guns - Aubrey's logical mind helped me fit the "puzzle pieces" together.  Almost everything fit.
 
Except for the stocking. That was sent in another package.
 
We sent packages about every three months during Elder Porter's mission. Some of the things he requested over the two years: a C.S. Lewis book, a jump drive, new socks, peanut butter (this was a most desired item and was included in every package), pictures, warm gloves, good razors, contact solution, and vitamins. We also sent lots of American food and candy (especially Milky Ways and Reeses) and assorted gear to handle the icy winters.

By far the gift we were most excited about was sent in December '11. We printed out the Russian letters spelling "Merry Christmas" and sent them to friends and family around the country. They took pictures of themselves holding a letter and emailed them back to us. We made the pictures into a Christmas garland. It was a lot of work but so awesome.

 

 

So now the package we are working on is the "Welcome Home" package which will be waiting for him. So far we have bought some big Milky Way candy bars, new scriptures (his request), Sudoku and Kakuro books, and an ipod touch (well, Aubrey's old ipod touch, but it will be new technology for Brandon!).  We can't wait!