To Pee or Not to Pee? That is the Question!

Flashback: I'm hanging on the side wall of the swimming pool with five minutes to go before swim lessons are over. I can't hold it any more I have got to pee. My, "please can I go to the bathroom?," is turned down by my instructor. Extremely annoyed and ready to explode I turn to the girl next to me and ask, "how come you never ask to go to the bathroom?" She responds with, "I just pee in the pool." I ask the boy on the other side and he responds like wise. Shock and horror!!! All these years I had been swimming in a giant toilet bowl.

Today: I'm chatting with a lady when all of a sudden her thirteen month old snot rockets into the swimming pool. Instead of going to the bathroom to wipe his nose she says, "Ew, ca-ca's" and wipes it with her fingers, holds it for a second as if I would look away or forget, then washes it off in the water. (At this point I have visions of Fort Rucker and scooping up loogies during water aerobics running through my head followed by inner shuddering.) Seriously lady, ya, it's your kid but what if every other mother did the exact same thing? Gross!!! I had to put it out of my mind in order to continue swimming with Makena.

So friends...what are your thoughts about the cesspools that we so gladly let our children play in. Are we at peace with the fact that even though hundreds of people have peed in the pool they are able to balance the PH with a little chlorine and other chemicals? or are we dry heaving at the idea of swimming in recycled toilet water? Is it ok to wipe your nose, your kids nose or anyone else's nose in the swimming pool? Today I would say heck no!!!

Am I overreacting? Of course, but when I relive these past traumatic experiences it takes me a while to calm down. I'm just saying that it might be a while before Makena and I head back to the pool.

More Winds of Change!

So are you ready for this!

Troy's deployment was cancelled last minute. They found out in mid August, just 3 weeks before they were supposed to leave to Texas. Troy did just over a month of pre-deployment training before he got the news. When he came home, Makena wouldn't let Troy put her down for hours. Even after, every time he started to leave the room, she would immediately drop everything and stay by his side. Good news for us as a family but bad news in many ways.

In preparation for the deployment we had sold Troy's commuter car, moved Rebekah and Makena to Southern Utah and all our stuff into storage, and Troy quit his job. After the deployment was cancelled and the shock wore off Troy began aggressively looking for a job, a car, and a home. A month later, within a weeks time Troy was able to procure a job, a car, and a home.

The house we were trying to buy in the spring fell thru, but we have now found one in a central location that both of us are excited about. The inspection came up with a number of trivial issues and only 1 possible minor issue. Another bonus to this is that it has rentable basement.

The state's military command has been very helpful and placed all those in need on temporary orders for a month to buy time for job/vehicle and housing searches. What a blessing that was. They arranged job fairs, resume classes, VA reps to help with job hunting and numerous efforts to help all the students get back into classes on time.

It's hard to know the reasons why things happen the way they do, but we can take faith that Heavenly Father always has a master plan that someday we will come to recognize. It just takes the time and effort to recognize how he has manipulated the pieces to come into place and then we must be thankful for what He has done to help us.

It has been a very stressful, busy yet productive time since the news first broke. What a ride!

Hope you are all doing well and hope to hear from you soon!!!

P.S.- Captions for the pics. 1st is Troy's bro. They came and visited while Troy was training. Makena took to him immediately and wanted him to put her in the car and sit with her the entire time. 2nd pic- Makena did not want to get off the horse, she absolutely loved every minute of it. 3rd pic-the tire only had about 500-800 miles on it. Didn't even find a piece of the tread. 3-5 seconds of thumping and almost lost control on the freeway! Glad it wasn't the front tire! Car prayers, yeah! 4th pic- Haven't had a family pic in a while. That's about as good a smile as you'll get out of Troy.