William Bespectacled!

A little over a week ago William got glasses. His dear teacher Mrs. MacNamara called me and suggested that we get him into the eye doctor as he had been having a hard time reading the board. He was SO EXCITED to get his glasses and the kids have been really cute in encouraging him. Even his school friends want glasses! I think he looks rather dashing! Poor Lizzie, with a big brother getting braces and a little brother getting glasses how will she ever compete for attention? I remember wanting both braces and glasses as a child and feeling so jealous of Lex when she got braces. I remember being very excited about glasses when I finally got some (for about 10 minutes...then got very tired of having to wear them!)

Well yesterday the glasses went missing. The place where we got them guaranteed total replacement for everything but loss so I was a little nervous. All night I had dreams about missing glasses. I wondered if this was an opportunity to discuss how prayers were answered. William has had a lot of questions about how to know if an answer is an answer from God or if it is just his own head telling him something. Last night before he went to bed he decided to do the work to enable the spirit to speak to him. First he said a prayer and then he made a map of all the places he had been yesterday and all the possible locations of his glasses.

This morning I offered a $5 reward to anyone who found them. A short time later Lizzie was the lucky girl. William's only regret was that he wasn't the one to get the reward!

Avoidance

I am always amazed at how omnipresent my desire is to avoid things that are hard.  I have needed to do both Anna and Lizzie's birthday tributes on this blog. I feel so guilty for not already having done it that I keep avoiding my blog all together causing me to miss out on time that I normally enjoy in putting down my thoughts and experiences. So I will now banish guilty feelings and just continue on with my writing. But not right now, I have laundry to do that I have been avoiding for days...

Trip Planning

I have been so excited lately because I am planning our summer excursion. 14 days of driving almost 3000 miles! Although I know the driving may become somewhat...tedious (to put it mildly) I still am so excited to see how it will go. I don't know why I love road trips so much. Let's face it, I just love all kinds of trips! I have this fantasy of Grant and me when we are old getting in the car, picking a random direction and just driving. I would choose for us to avoid interstates, eat at local (not chain) restaurants and stay in little B&B's along the way. We would have no itinerary or agenda but to be together driving, talking, exploring, listening to audio books... Doesn't that sound magical? (That is, when we aren't at our seaside, four-room, all-bookshelf-and-window cottage or serving missions in the far corners of the world!)

For now, when I plan a vacation I have our campsites and hotels reserved 5-6 months in advance, and packing lists assembled. I am putting together play lists and audio books on my I-pod...I have mapped our our itinerary and planned our routes... definitely a different experience traveling with four children! At any rate, I am just excited to be going somewhere. I am excited to be seeing some of the beauties of our nation that I have wanted to see for more than 20 years (namely Yosemite). I wonder a little if we will be inundated with grandeur. Will we feel like after so many days of seeing so many amazing things will we be thinking, "Oh look another really big tree. Oh look, another ocean view. More big rocks."? Will we take it all for granted and how can I make sure the we are grateful and inspired every day by what we are seeing? I'm going to have to include this question in my trip planning.

I am grateful for my love of travel, though sometimes I feel like it is a curse. Why does it have to be so expensive?!? The world is such a wonderful, interesting place. Thank goodness for books! For the time being I can travel to far away places through the written word!