Carson goes camping and hiking again this week for stake YM camp. He's pretty much done with traveling soccer now, but he's been going to school soccer practices twice a week since he's one of the captains. He's now enrolled in the community college so he can do a hybrid option next year of high school and college. He doesn't want to be in the high school full time, but he's not looking to do college full time either. Technically we'll have 4 kids in college next school year. Uffdah.
Paige doesn't have a plane ticket back to college yet, so it's open-ended how long she'll stay here this summer. She did well getting her wisdom teeth out, she's managing the pain okay, but now she's hungry and her cheeks are swollen. It was me who had problems. When the receptionist told me all the post-op information, the room started spinning and going black. I excused myself and stumbled away to collapse in a chair for a while until I felt better. She said I'm not the only one. It happened again at home, when after a few hours Paige took out the bloody gauze, rinsed, and was putting more gauze in. I came to help, but just the sight of it made the room start spinning and going black again. I headed for the couch to recover. I'm a wimp. I get to look forward to this again in a few months because Carson needs his teeth out but we'll have to schedule around sports and vacations and can't do it right now.
Leah is still working as a cook and server at a nursing home and volunteering at the local food bank. She volunteers at the temple every Friday night. She was going to YSA activities many times each week for a long time, until some guys spooked her. She's not looking for serious relationships right away (like, after only one date) or to give up her college plans, and they shouldn't be pushing her to. She's excited to go back to college and have more to do and friends around to do things with. Adjusting to non-missionary life has been hard for her.
Colby chose to take spring and summer classes, moving along his computer engineering path. He should finish in a year or year and a half. Before our Boundary Waters and Italy trips, he sarcastically told us, "Make sure you all have fun while I'm just sitting here in class and working hard. Don't worry about me." He wants to get through more classes this summer, but we've missed him. He still has a network engineer job that he really likes. He moves to a different apartment complex and single room in August.
We’re binge watching Mission Impossible, Hunger Games, Harry Potter, and Pirates of the Caribbean. On Friday nights Dan and Carson play volleyball, and I walk the church hallways. We've played a few family games, and right now Code Names is the favorite. We dusted off the ping pong table today. Dan and the kids play pickleball and racquetball a few times each week.
Yesterday we walked along Summit Avenue in St. Paul, full of Victorian mansions from the Gilded Age. We toured the James J. Hill mansion. I already shared pictures last fall of that house, so I didn't take any this time. Then we went to the Mill City Museum in Minneapolis.
In September before school starts, Dan, Carson and I are going to a concert with friends to see REO Speedwagon, Loverboy, and Styx in Duluth. Carson enjoys older rock and roll music, so he knows all the songs. We're excited.
We have a vacation planned to Hawaii later this year. With Colby's mission and him coming home during the pandemic when things were shut down, and then with Leah serving a mission, and everyone in different locations now, it's been a while since our family could vacation all together.
I hope to have all our kids together for Christmas this year, a first since December 2017.
