A Visit From Grandma & Grandpa Nash, Who Helped Us Paint A Room (Again)

My parents came from Colorado to visit us during the first full week of January this year. This was the first time they've come to visit us since last spring, when they attended Lorelai's school play and celebrated Easter with us. We, on the other hand, still haven't been back to Colorado for a while...not since my parents sold my childhood home and moved into the nearby retirement community! With any luck, we'll make it back to Colorado multiple times this year, but for now it was good to see my parents again.

Although we'd talked about them coming to visit in January, they ended up making the final decision to travel at the very last minute. For a while, I had been worried they wouldn't be coming at all. Over the last few months, my mom and dad have both had some major health problems. In two months, my dad has spent multiple nights in a hospital. Last November, he was visiting my sister in Utah when he stopped breathing at church one Sunday(!). It turned out he was reacting badly to some new medication. Then on Christmas Eve, he was hospitalized with a nasty strain of the flu that had been going around Colorado.

Long story short, I have been pretty worried about my parents' health lately, and though I wanted to see them, I was on pins and needles at the thought of them traveling during the cold winter in their vulnerable state. When we called them the weekend before they were scheduled to arrive, they were still on the fence about coming at all. But then Celeste got on the phone and pleaded with them to come, and her sweet earnestness apparently won them over. They flew into Tucson very late Monday night, then rented a car and drove to our house, arriving at about two in the morning on Tuesday, January 6th.

To my relief, my fears about my parents' frailty turned out to be a bit exaggerated. Although they were definitely still tired out and somewhat low-energy, they were in good spirits and enthusiastic about playing with the girls. They also wanted to help out with whatever home projects we'd been putting off due to either time or budgetary constraints.

It may make me sound immature to say I love being spoiled by my parents, but...I love being spoiled by my parents! They have helped us out in many big decisions in life, and it is so nice when they can help out with many "little" projects that we have been putting off due to a lack of time or money. It is so nice to get assistance with home projects (even the easy ones), since it frees us up to get bigger, more immediate concerns dealt with later on our own. Plus, they take me clothes shopping, which is always nice. It is great to get some new, smaller-sized clothes now that I have lost some weight.

There were two small-ish home improvement projects that my parents bankrolled. The first was putting up new curtains for the balcony door in our master bedroom. In a way, this has been the most eagerly anticipated home project since Nathan and I moved into this house! Before my parents came, our balcony door was covered by these gigantic, heavy, incredibly flimsy vertical blinds:

Nathan's parents helped us install these blinds when we first moved into the house in 2011. We were certainly grateful for the window covering. The morning sun shines right through that door, after all, and the blinds did an excellent job of blocking out the light. However, we have had to tread so lightly around those blinds over the years that they've long since worn out their welcome. If I walked too quickly past them while going into or out of the bathroom, the force of my passing would jar one of the panels loose. And when one blind panel fell down, more often than not, most of the panels would fall down. The panels are heavy and unbalanced, and are a huge pain to reattach to the slide.

This was an especially big problem when the girls had friends over to play, and they'd run into Mom's room (already a no-no), and then offer to show their friends the balcony (another no-no). Invariably, this would end with the kids tripping over a huge pile of collapsed blinds in a guilty retreat...and with me re-hanging the blinds alone, cursing under my breath.

Now, thanks to the intervention of my parents, I will never have to deal with collapsed blinds again! We took a trip to the local Bed Bath & Beyond, and purchased some new blackout curtains, along with a new rod.

In the last several months, few things have given me as much savage satisfaction as taking down all those blinds and cutting them in half...so they would fit in our trash can! No, we never planned on selling the blinds to anyone else...I wouldn't wish that fate on anybody! Hopefully, they are minding their own business at the local landfill as I write this.

Here's what our balcony doors look like now:

Since we haven't painted our bedroom yet, I wanted to choose a fairly neutral color for the curtains, and one that didn't clash too badly with the blue inside the master bathroom, which I painted a few months back. I think these curtains let in a tiny bit more sunlight than did the blinds, but overall it's a huge upgrade. Now we can move on and off our balcony much more freely, and our room looks a little homier than it did before.

The other home project was a little more ambitious, but yielded even better results; we painted the girls' bathroom and bought some new matching towels to go with it!

We have been letting the girls' bathroom mats get gradually junkier and more unraveled over the last several months...we knew that a bathroom remodel was coming, but we didn't have the exact date. When my parents showed up and offered their assistance (both in labor and in financing), we decided to move forward on the project!

As with the master bathroom painting a few months ago, Nathan was caught off-guard somewhat by the suddenness of this painting project. Painting rooms has a sort of freight-train momentum for me; once I get started, I just can't stop until the job is done! Nathan helped out as best he could, and he helped install some new wall hooks in both bathrooms after the painting was done. He installed a new towel ring for the girls' bathroom as well. Now they have more places to hang towels/bathrobes/etc. I suspect this will come in handy the older they get, and the more accessorizing they do.

Most of the taping and actual painting was done by my father and myself. Grandma, as usual, kept the kids out of our hair for the most part. The job went much faster than I thought; from start to finish, it probably only took us a day and a half (including breaks for sleeping, eating, & socializing). Maybe because I'd already done the master bathroom almost all by myself, but the girl's bathroom felt so much easier to do! And we even painted all the walls this time! (Nathan and I have often left one wall of a room unpainted, both for contrast and because we're lazy.) Taping around the mirrors, sinks, & light fixtures was definitely more tedious, but my dad ended up doing a lot of that. Thank goodness for some extra helping hands.

After the main painting job was done, and after all the wall hangings were re-attached, we went shopping one more time for the cosmetic finishing touches. Once again, my parents were super helpful in this regard.

We already had three larger purple bath towels (they were monogrammed, one for each girl; a gift from our sister-in-law Molly). We had to buy brand-new bath mats, hand towels, and toilet seat covers to finish the purple motif. We never quite got a complete set; there was no toilet seat cover in the matching purple color we chose. Oh well, we settled for a white cover, and it looks fine. And although the new bath mats and hand towels don't quite match the purple towels we already had, they don't outright clash, either. And both types of towels match nicely with the purple walls. We got really lucky with this paint color; it is a very accommodating hue of purple!

The nice final touch was getting a new shower curtain. For many years, we've gotten by with a flimsy boring white plastic curtain. It made the whole room look very washed-out. I wasn't really sure what type of shower curtain I wanted, but I definitely wanted more color! I didn't really find any curtains with any good purple accents, so I went a different direction and got a loud black-and-white pattern:

Everyone loved the new room; friends, family, and especially the girls! I'm so happy they can have a nice room of their very own. And once again, I'm super grateful to my parents for all their help. It is so nice to have this project completed! Our next task is an intimidating one; Nathan and I are hoping to paint our stairwell by the end of this year! We are not looking forward to it, but we are wanting to get it over with!

Besides those projects, we made no other large-scale plans with my parents. We hung around the house; played with the kids; spent most nights playing board games (we had lots of fun with Stone Age, which we played several times); discussed our respective health/family situations; and ate out a few times. They attended sacrament meeting with us, but went home afterwards to avoid exposure to more illnesses (a wise move, in my opinion, given the number of young children in our ward). They also attended the girls' very first volleyball game (more on their volleyball adventures in a future blog post). And of course, we went out to eat a few times as well.

These pictures were taken after dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen. For some reason, I keep forgetting to take lots of pictures of my parents when they come to visit. Luckily, I think these pictures turned out great and say a lot about who my parents are and how much my girls love them. They are always so happy to see my parents, and we are all so grateful for this time we have together.

We celebrated an early "birthday" with Aurora, by opening her present from the grandparents the Sunday night before they headed home. The next day (Monday, January 12th), "normal" life began again. The older girls headed to school, and Grandma and Grandpa packed their bags and loaded up the rental car, in preparation to head back to the airport. Aurora was eager to climb into the car and go with them; when she realized just what was happening, she burst into tears and was inconsolable for long after her beloved grandparents drove away.

Deep inside, I was crying right along with Aurora; I always miss my parents when they leave. Not just for their gifts and financial aid (although those have been wonderful blessings as well), but for how much love they leave with us. I hope my parents know how grateful I always am for all the things (both big and small) they have offered us over the years. Everything they do and say is filled with kindness and concern for our well-being. They want so much to be involved in our lives in whatever way works for us; they want to know us, understand us, help us, laugh with us, and share things with us.

I am so glad for their generous spirits, their hard work, and their sacrifices they make for us. Coming as it did just a few months after my father-in-law's death, I was especially grateful for this visit, and for the chance to enjoy every moment with my parents that we have left. I am glad my mom and dad were healthy enough to make the trip, and I pray they will recover quickly and have a healthy and prosperous year. Hopefully we will see them again this spring!

Top Of The World, Ma!

This won't be a terribly long, detailed blog post...it's mostly a bunch of pictures from our sledding trip on January 2nd. Yes, a sledding trip! I realize in many parts of the country this would be a commonplace activity this time of year. However, we live in southern Arizona, so an opportunity to go sledding in the snow is a rare, delightful treat.

Last winter (2013-14) was almost depressingly warm. It hovered around 80 degrees for much of January and February. While I mostly enjoy the mild Arizona winters, there are times when I crave cold days too. Days requiring jackets and/or sweaters. Days with hot cocoa, warm socks, and blankets. Days with rain or (if we're lucky) snow. And this winter, our luck held out! Throughout the Christmas/New Year week, it was cloudy, cold, and rainy.

And winter rains in Tucson usually translate to snowfall atop Mount Lemmon, the peak just north of town. I'm always excited when snow falls on Mount Lemmon during the holiday break; it means the girls and I can pile up in the car and go check out the snow! We've done this a couple of times over the last few years; it's great when the snow pays us a visit during the school break. I love seeing the snow because a part of me still misses the cold, snowy winters of my youth. My girls love the snow because it's a novelty rarely seen in their lives. Either way, we were all willing to brave the long drive up the mountain for the chance to experience a little winter.

Except Nathan, that is, who apparently doesn't miss the snow as much as I do. Plus, he had a golf lesson and home improvement project to do, and those things were better completed without the rest of the family around. No matter...everyone had a good time wherever they were!

The clouds hung very low on Mount Lemmon the day we drove up. No snow was falling, but the visibility halfway up the mountain was pretty poor. Luckily, the roads were dry, so I was able to drive carefully and take my time. When we got past 5,000 feet, some incredible views awaited us...

It felt like we had emerged from the fog into a fantasy land. I was almost able to convince myself that we were no longer in Arizona!

The view was rugged and amazing, and ignited all our imaginations. Plus, it reminded me of a few scenes from the Lord of the Rings movies, which we had coincidentally just finished showing our girls for the first time (the fun starts about 1:00 into the video):

I almost fancied I could see some of those beacons of Gondor way off in the distance!

We got out and wandered around a bit at Windy Point Vista. Many of the walkways were completely covered by ice, which the girls have virtually no experience with. There were many slips and stumbles as we made our way up to the overlook. Everybody was clinging pretty desperately to the railing, too.

We also saw some tiny icicles on a nearby tree, which the girls were fascinated by.

After a good look around, we drove all the rest of the way up the mountain. We have made the drive up snowy Mount Lemmon three times now, and this was the first time the roads were clear enough to make it all the way to Summerhaven, the small town at the top of the mountain. I even got to drive up to the ski resort outside Summerhaven, and it was actually open!

Of course, the parking at this resort is woefully inadequate; there were cars parked alongside the road for a half-mile or more.

 

Lots of transplanted ski bums were swarming the slopes on this day, so the best we could do was take a peek out the window at the ski slopes and the moving chairlift. Then we headed a little ways back down the mountain, to find a good sledding hill.

There was a fair amount of snow on the mountain, so we didn't have to look too hard for a good sledding hill. A lot of other people had the same idea we did, but we managed to get in a few good runs down the hill before being overrun.

 

It was a pretty nice hill, all things considered! Our friends the Nielsens had let us borrow their sled again for this trip. This year, the girls were all big enough to take it on solo rides (except Aurora, who flat-out refused). Celeste wiped out pretty hard the first trip down, but she shook it off fairly quickly and managed another trip or two. Lorelai had the most fun, and she was a good sport about lugging the sled up and down the hill.

Unfortunately (for me, anyway), my kids are still a little wimpy when it comes to snow. After a half-hour or so of sledding, Aurora began to cry and beg to get into the car, where she could dry off and warm up. Celeste followed soon after, and even Lorelai caved in shortly after that. I took one more good run down the hill, then resignedly loaded up the car and headed down the mountain.

Celeste was more interested in eating the snow than in sledding on it

I'd made the girls wear layers of clothes this time, and I think that helped them stay warm for much longer than our previous trips. However, their hands all got very cold very fast; if we are going to be doing much more playing in the snow, the girls definitely need better gloves to protect their hands!

Goodbye, awesome sledding hill...until next time!

We made it down through the foggy lowlands back into Tucson (barely...our "low fuel" light flashed as we descended, so we coasted on fumes for much of the trip). Before heading home, we refilled the car, had some late lunch at Carl's Jr., and warmed ourselves back up. We spent the rest of the night relaxing at home and eating junk food. It's a lot of driving to see the sights atop Mount Lemmon, but we always enjoy it! Maybe if I do this for enough years in a row, my girls will actually be able to tolerate the snow for longer periods of time. Then again, they are desert-born, so I may be fighting a losing battle here.

Ringing In 2015

After the holiday rush is done, there's usually a wonderful period of sitting around the house, not doing anything particularly important. Such was our situation after our Phoenix day trip. What should we do, to finish off 2014?

Well, we watched more of our Christmas DVDs. We ate more junk food. Nathan golfed a little bit. The girls played with their Christmas gifts and worked on some crafts. I tried to act as lazy as possible. But we also found time to have a little family fun...like cashing in the girls' Build-A-Bear gift cards that they got for Christmas!

The girls have been wanting to go to Build-A-Bear for a very long time now. All our girls are big stuffed-animal fans, even nine-year-old Lorelai, so watching their very own stuffed animal being made was doubtless a dream come true for them. Personally, I've never been that interested in how stuffed animals are made, but hey...it's their present, not mine. So one afternoon, the whole family drove up to the Tucson Mall and visited the local Build-A-Bear store.

Unfortunately for the girls, we did put a price cap on their purchases. That darn store can get very expensive very fast! That meant no Ninja Turtle or My Little Pony stuffed animals. And no wardrobe, either (seriously, who needs a wardrobe for their stuffed animals?). Yes, we were cheapskates, but the girls still managed to find a product that satisfied them.

Aurora was the only girl who didn't build an actual "bear"...she found a cat that she fell in love with!

Watching each animal get stuffed, massaged, and sewed up was kind of a mesmerizing experience.

 

The girls also enjoyed picking out a small silk "heart" to place inside their bears:

 

Here are the final results of all their labors...meet the newest stuffed members of our family!

Celeste's rainbow-colored bear is named Sparkle Princess Bear. A very fitting name for Celeste's bear, indeed. Oddly enough, Celeste also chose a sound chip to put inside her bear; it was the sound of a ferocious roar! So even though Sparkle Princess Bear has kind of a sissy name, she's pretty tough on the inside! Aurora's kitty-cat was named Princess Precious. Seeing a pattern here? Well, it was a pattern of two bears, because Lorelai named her camo-bear Army Bear...and she got a sound card that played the "Star Wars" theme! Overall, it was an interesting mishmash of styles and personalities; kind of like our girls themselves.

Each bear got its own "birth certificate" at the store, complete with its full name, size, coloration, and date of "birth." This made it all seem very official. The girls felt the trip was a success, and they've been very pleased with their bears. Our family also stopped by Bookmans after our Build-A-Bear adventure was done, and loaded up on second-hand books & movies. That's becoming another post-holiday tradition for us!

This outing was to be our last major outing of 2014. The following day, we only had time to buy a few groceries, then set up for our New Year's Eve party, complete with a big dinner, lots of friends (we had the Perrys come over, as well as our next-door neighbors the Gillespies), and plenty of board-game action. Even the missionaries stopped by for a brief visit! It was a fun evening, and the kids running around and shouting added to the delightful chaos.

Lorelai has made it to midnight the last few years; Celeste badly wanted 2014 to be the year she made it, too. But three-quarters of the way through The Lego Movie, she just couldn't hang in there any more:

That extra girl is our neighbor Jamie...she fell asleep about when Aurora did.

Once again, Lorelai was the only Barrett child who made it to midnight with her parents (who barely made it themselves; all our friends cleared out around 11:15 or so, so we fought to stay awake after that). Celeste was very upset the next morning, but we reassured her that her day would come, one of these years. Our New Year's Day was relatively uneventful: we slept in, we watched the Tournament Of Roses parade, and we ate our traditional New Year's Day breakfast:

Monkey bread! Never begin the new year without it: that's my motto. Well, it would be my motto, if I had one. We spent much of the rest of the day hanging out, eating junk food, and playing games at the Perry's house (returning the favor of their coming to our house the night before!). It was indeed a wonderful way to ring in the new year.

As you might have seen in our last blog post of 2014, this previous year had many emotional ups and downs for us. We don't exactly know what to expect in the coming year, but we hope 2015 will bring us happiness, peace and (relative) prosperity. I am trying to work on the little things (increasing my personal prayer & scripture study, being a kinder person, etc.), in the hope that these things will better prepare me for the "big things" when they come along, whether good or bad. Here's wishing you all a successful, blessed 2015 as well. I'll keep the blog updated; stay tuned!

A Post-Christmas Tale Of Two Temples

A holiday tradition our family has enjoyed doing for the last few years is taking an overnight trip to the Phoenix area. We stay in a hotel (or with a friend), and Nathan and I will do a session inside the LDS temple (until last year, the temple in Mesa was our one and only option in the area). Besides that, we will take the kids to see the Christmas lights and nativity display outside the Mesa temple; we'll have a family dinner at a nice restaurant; and we'll usually have one or two extra family activities planned.

This year, due to budget reasons, we scaled back our Phoenix trip somewhat. We decided not to do an overnighter. Instead, we left early in the morning and returned late in the evening. We also didn't eat out multiple times, and we scaled down the number of paid recreational activities. Even with this downsized day out, we still had an enjoyable, peaceful day together.

One new bonus of our Phoenix trip this holiday season was that we had multiple temples to choose from when planning our visit! In the last year, two new LDS temples were opened in the Phoenix area; we were lucky enough to attend both open houses (and attend both temple dedications via satellite in our local meetinghouse). Both temples were now "open for business," and I wanted to visit one of the new temples as a change of pace.

Luckily, I have a friend/former mission companion named Heidi who lives close to the Gilbert temple. She agreed to watch our kids for a couple of hours while we did some initiatories there. The Gilbert temple wasn't as decked out for Christmas as the Mesa temple always is...but they did have this cute little nativity on the temple grounds!

 

We are really lucky to to have friends willing to offer their services to us so that we can enjoy the blessings of the Lord's house. The visit had added meaning because it was on December 27, 2014...our thirteenth wedding anniversary!

It's always nice to visit the temple on our anniversary. It reminds me how fortunate I am to be married to a good, righteous man, and to have made covenants that will help me live with him forever, so long as I remain worthy and do my best to be Christ-like. Marrying Nathan was one of the best decisions I've made in my life, and I am so grateful for the happiness that decision has brought me.

After our visit to the Gilbert temple was finished, we decided to do something fun, to help the girls get their wiggles out. They were very well-behaved at Heidi's house, but they needed a chance to play! We spent a couple of hours at Makutu's Island, an indoor play area we've visited a few times. It had been closed for renovation for the last several months, but luckily it opened up in time for us to pay a visit.

The girls ran and played and ran and played and ran and played for about two hours inside Makutu's Island. In the meantime, Nathan and I got a lot of reading done! The kids were able to coax me inside one of the bigger slides, but for the most part I was happy to sit back and watch them play.

There were a couple of new additions to the amusement center, including a bungee-cord jumper and a short zip line, which the kids used over and over and over again.

After they all struck their requisite poses with the animal sculptures (and got photo-bombed by Daddy a few times), it was time to collect our shoes and head for the exit. It was dinnertime! We ate dinner (as we so often do) at Rudy's BBQ, a delicious Texas-style BBQ joint in Chandler. It never fails to disappoint.

Once our bellies were full, it was time to go check out the lights at the Mesa Temple...our second temple of the day!

 

Even though we always see these lights after Christmas is over, they never fail to get me back into the "Christmas spirit." The light displays are tastefully done, and the music and words piped through the gardens is inspiring.

 I especially love the statue of Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus, which rests just above a reflecting pool:

It's simple, yet powerful. I am so grateful for the birth of our Savior, and grateful for the hope that gives to all mankind.

After checking out the lights outside, the girls wanted to go inside the visitor's center, and take a look at the large marble Christus statue. It's one of their favorite parts of visiting the temple! There was a large crowd in the visitor's center that night, so we had to wait to see it for a few minutes.

The girls sometimes have a hard time waiting.

After enjoying the lights, we piled into the car and pulled onto the freeway, headed home. It was a long drive late in the evening, but we were overall very satisfied with our trip. We might head up to Phoenix again for a mini-trip during Spring Break; we'll see. But we were very grateful for the chance to visit two temples and have fun as a family. There was still more fun ahead for the rest of the holiday break!