The book of Answers

Once when I was young, I either heard or read somewhere that the book or Mormon has all the answers to any question you would ever ask. I can't remember where I heard that, nor if it's true, but to a certain extent, I believed it enough to turn to it when I needed an answer to prayer. Specifically, taking it to mean when I have lost something; if the book could tell me anything, it could tell me where to find whatever went missing. This method has yet to fail me. For example, when Kevin was living with us in the Orem house, I lost my cell phone. It had been missing for days and I couldn't find it anywhere. I had searched every room, even Kevin's. Now, when I lose something, it usually goes something like this: prayer in my mind as I'm looking, to later stopping what I'm doing and saying a slightly longer prayer in my mind and keep looking, to finally (usually days later of no success) kneeling down and vocally pleading. By now, you'd think I'd be smart enough to just skip to the last step ;) So anyway, I was on the last step of sincere prayer and knowing the Book of Mormon could tell me, I opened the scriptures and just read. The first words to the verse I read was "Look down". It just so happened that down below was Kevin's room. So, trusting what I had read, I went down and looked again. Well, the phone ended up being in that room, folded up in Kevin's jacket. So this week, I have misplaced my wallet or rather thin card case that fits in my pocket. It has been missing since Saturday. After searching and cleaning everything with no success, today was the day I pleaded with the Lord to find it and then here come the scriptures in my mind. I usually just see the name of the book and verse I need to turn to in my head if I don't feel I should just open the book. So today I felt I should actually read two verses. 2 Nephi 2:2 & 24. "2 ... thou knowest the greatness of God; and he shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.24 But behold, all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things." I can't say that I am happy about the answer that I got, but I know and am grateful for the reminder that down to every little detail in my life, there is a reason behind it that will be used for my good. I suppose even if that reason means having to get all new credit cards, license, and temple recommend. On a less spiritual note, I have been trying to get the master bedroom all put away, so I could be 100% sure my wallet was nowhere in there. So, I needed to attach the dresser mirror to the dresser so I could unpack all the dresser decor and proceed fully unpacking. Well, who knows where the screws went since whoever helped us move didn't put the screws back in the dresser. So on Saturday, my last day of having my wallet, I went to the store and bought screws. Came home, no, screws were wrong size. Put off cleaning room. Today, the whole family goes to the store and I buy the right size. Come home, place the mirror up and what do you know, the holes don't line up right. Upon closer examination, since the mirror was sideways and not upright, they just screwed a bunch of smaller regular screws that we happen to have an endless supply of. lol. But after it all, we have a mirror up. So I'm happy.

I guess I should say I am glad that Joshua is my only climber, but goodness, I am not ready for this. lol Will and I had the best talk tonight. It started off with us marking dates on the calendar. I marked his birthday and my anniversary. Will asked what that was and I told him it was like a birthday for our marriage. He asked what you do on an anniversary and I told him we might go out to eat or go on a special date. He began to get very anxious and concerned, to the point of tears, that if we went on a date without him, I wouldn't have time for him. Dave and I haven't had a date since we lived in Provo, so I sat Will down and talked about how moms and dads are supposed to go on dates and that once our house is reasonably put together, we will get babysitters for a couple of hours once or twice a month so we can go out. I had to go through why dates are important and how just like I need special time with my kids, I also need it with daddy. Then this... Will: Once you go on a date for your anniversary, we should go on more dates. Me: (quiet chuckle) Why? Will: Because I love you more than daddy loves you. Oh my, I couldn't hold the tears back. Will is so attached to me. I can't leave him without giving him a hug and a kiss or he has a major episode and even then, it's hard for him to be without me for too long. He wants to go everywhere with me. And he even cried telling me he never wanted to get married because he doesn't want to leave me. I told him he'd never have to, but he might change his mind ;) So, continuing on, I talked about how me and Dave need to have a happy marriage and that going on dates helps keep us happy. Then I don't know why I said this, but I told him about our neighbor that is divorced and said I want to try and have as strong a family as I can because I don't want daddy to ever want to leave me. Me: Wouldn't you be sad if daddy left? Will: (starting to sound emotional) Well I would just be so sad and cry and cry for ever if you left. Then there was a lot of I would never leave you talk and then he said, "Well if you ever leave, I'm coming with you." lol In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have talked about parents leaving families, but it just came out. Then he proceeds with talk about us dying. Will: Well if you and daddy both die, I will just be all alone. I won't know what to do with Maddy... or Joshy.... I won't even know what to do with myself. :'( At this point I'm like bawling and go through the whole thing about how when we don't know what to do, we just ask Heavenly Father, etc... And then list off all of my family who would help take care of them if anything ever did happen like that. He really is so scared about dying. He told me once if he died, he would float up to outer space and be so alone and scared. Anyway, It was an interesting talk and I think ended pretty well. Halloween was ok. Kids had too much sugar and were going crazy. Yesterday I went to 6 stores to get marked down decorations and props for next year. We are going to have an awesome yard next year!

I am so tired of doing kitchen stuff and tiling that I decided to take a day and do some paint stripping among other things that needed doing. The stairs are oak, which I really really dislike, so I have chosen to go with a dark mahogany stain. That should make it look about as good as it can I think. lol. It has been a pretty productive day. I have all the tile for the backsplash and will do that next week. After that, we'll just need to install the hood vent, put all the finish trim on the cabinets, put my mural up on the wall, baseboards, and the kitchen will be, dare I say, DONE! Maddy and Will play with this kid 2 houses down a lot. Maddy was crying today because Sam said she couldn't go hunting. I guess their family was going hunting and I asked Maddy if she even knew what hunting was and she said no. haha

Progress

I tiled all day and am exhausted. Hopefully we can get the kitchen table back in there beginning of next week. Woot

A different kind of progress

Today was supposed to be the day I cleared out the dining area and ripped up the rest of the linoleum.  I started moving stuff out of the room, but got side tracked and ended up putting up a light fixture with Dave, clearing all the tools off the island so we can actually use it, and putting knobs on the cabinet drawers. I'll probably clear everything else out tonight and rip up the floor on Monday.  We rented a floor scraper from home depot for the other part, but it was a hassle to bring home since it weighed like 200 pounds, so I'm hoping it won't be super hard to just use the hand scraper.  The last few days have been a pain.  When I grouted the first tiles under the appliances, I just did what the youtubes did and everything turned out good.  Well, Dave decided to read the instructions which said to leave the grout in for 15 minutes before sponging off the tiles.  By the time we tried getting all the grout out of the nooks and crannies, it was dried up.  I was trying to get grout out with a toothbrush, it was midnight, and both of us were sore and had hurting backs, so we had to call it a night.  Our bodies just couldn't go anymore.  The next day I tried using different things I read that should soften the grout, but none of it worked.  Then, I tried using a steel brush, what everyone said would scratch up the slate and you shouldn't use.  Well, it did not scratch the tiles, except for one, which was a lighter sheen and thinner, but even that was easily buffed out.  The grout just came right up, but I've been scraping tiles for days and it still didn't get everything.  I got some concrete dissolver to help it along, but it's still a long process.  I'm taking a break since my fingers hurt.  Pictures of the kids having a contest of who has the biggest smile, new knobs, and a fly strip which a nice lady in my ward gave me after I told her we had hundreds of flies due to doors being open from renovations.  The fly strip has over 120 flies on it.  I got more and they have a bunch on them too.

So tired of laboring. Feet and hands hurt. Not close enough to being done. I sealed the tile tonight in the kitchen and will grout tomorrow. I absolutely love slate, but I will never use it again. Since it is natural stone, it's not 100% square, the thickness varies up to a third of an inch, and oh the maintenance...so much sealing... I had hoped to have the tile done, but hurt my foot last week and couldn't walk, so I had to take a break. The pictures are of me sealing the tile and the cabinets that are in, but have no trim up yet. It's going to look great with the hood vent and backsplash when we finally get to it. The kids are loving school and I am just trying to keep on keeping on. I've been pretty depressed lately. I'm afraid wellbutrin isn't working like it used to.