When Allen and I were first married his paternal grandparents gave me a sewing machine. They told me that they couldn't imagine someone having kids and no sewing machine to create things on. My mom was always an amazingly talented seamstress but I was pretty lacking in the sewing department. However, this was a game changer for me.
The machine came with a free class on how to operate it and that was what got me excited about the possibilities. I started out just making blankets because I figured anyone could sew a bunch of squares together. They turned out pretty good and so I ventured into the territory of making a dress or two for Elle when she was really young and didn't care what she was wearing. Those turned out pretty great, too. I even tried making some of my own maternity clothes once. They were so fashionable and well-made! (Well, at least I thought so until I got them out for my next pregnancy and realized how homemade they looked. But still!) The thing I quickly realized was that anyone can sew if they're willing to read a pattern and follow directions. I could even create Halloween costumes without a pattern as long as I was willing to make a few mistakes along the way.
This is why, when the drama teacher at the high school asked if I could help with costumes for the musical Seussical this year, I said yes. It has actually been a lot of fun! Thumbelina is helping too - she did most of the work on this pile of Who-Girl dresses:
while I'm just doing a bunch of random things like sewing a hidden pocket into the back of a dress or re-constructing existing costumes with feathers and trim and ribbons and adjustments or making this bird-girl dress a bit longer and that Thing 2 outfit a bit smaller.
It has been a fun way to be involved in something I loved in high school without having to be away from home. I'm grateful for insightful grandparents who gifted me my sewing machine and helped me to discover talents I didn't even know I had!
It has happened. The day I have dreaded for a long time. Little X has figured out how to get around the child-proof doorknob thingies.
Here he is, caught in the act!
Here he is again, mocking my loss of control over the pantry, bathrooms and toy closet.
My kids are all growing up so fast. Even this littlest munchkin who it seems crazy to call The Baby anymore. There is good in this, though - and that's where having a large family becomes a huge blessing.
When I look at All-a-Boy sleeping in church or hear of Hubba's inability to keep answers to himself at school I can look at what an awesome young man Allen the Younger has become despite having done these same things when he was younger.
When I see how overly emotional and sensitive to every little thing I do or say some of my younger girls are or worry that I am never doing anything right as a parent I can look to how Elle turned out and see that, despite all of my faults and weaknesses as a mother and person, she turned out beautifully.
I have learned to appreciate the hard times because they seem to be what makes our kids into amazing adults. I don't always remember to appreciate the difficulties but I am thankful to have both perspectives to help me remember that I'm doing okay.
Thursday night was spent doing something I always enjoy - taking in some local musical theater. However, this time it was different because my friend Jenny was in the cast.
When she first came on stage I had to stop myself from crying. And when I saw her owning the dance numbers (something I am awesome at in my head but my body can just NOT figure out how to do what I want it to) I had to hold back the tears again. These were high energy dance numbers. Why was I crying?!?!
I was not thinking I would cry before I went. It never even crossed my mind. But there was something about seeing her there on stage, having a dream to perform on stage again after 18 years and LIVING it, knowing she nailed her first audition... I don't know. It just got to me.
If you want to read her inspiring story, click HERE. And if you live near me and haven't seen In the Heights yet, you should. The energy on stage is awesome and even Allen, who lived in the Dominican Republic for a couple of years, says they capture the feeling of living in the barrio perfectly.
I am thankful for friends who inspire me by living their dreams, for letting me see that anything is possible with hard work and determination. And I hope Jenny doesn't mind me kind of living vicariously through her talent in performing.
Someday I would love to be on stage again. However, I accepted a long time ago that I could never be cast as a main character in a musical because of my great lack of ability in the dancing department. I've decided that once all of my kids have left the nest I could maybe audition for the part of a nun in my favorite musical of all time, Newsies, or as one of the crazy old ladies in the play Arsenic and Old Lace.
I am very thankful for these four awesome women who teach my elementary school kids this year. They all seem to have the perfect personalities to fit each of our kids.
I love going to parent/teacher conferences every time. Not because I get to chase kids around the gym while we're waiting our turn to talk to each teacher but because I love hearing about how awesome my kids are.
I am grateful that these women chose to be teachers and really put their hearts into what they do every day. These are the people who make school a place that my kids love to go to. I am also grateful to the many teachers at the middle school and high school who make a difference in my kids lives. My family spends a lot of time in the public school system and we are very blessed to live in an area where we can feel okay about that.
I've been thinking about this a lot lately and I finally decided to just get it written down so I can stop writing it in my head. In the whole last year since my friend Jason died(<< there's a link there in case you don't know what I'm talking about) I have gone through all sorts of crazy emotions and thoughts. I wanted to write about him all the time and I didn't want to write about him at all. I think the best way I can explain it is that I didn't want to feel like I had to prove our friendship to anyone. At the same time I worried that he would be forgotten. I don't know if that makes any sense but that's what's at the surface of my train of thought.
Since Jason's untimely death I have distanced myself from others. This is something I have noticed recently and have some regrets about but all I can do from here is move on and try to be better. I think that somewhere in my subconscious I am worried that I will lose someone again, so unexpectedly and suddenly and tragically and without any warning. I do not know that my heart could handle it. But, like I said, I am trying to change.
There are a million things I could say that I haven't over the last year, but the one thing that really stands out lately is this: in losing Jason I have gained something else - a whole network of friends who look out for and care about each other. Because Jason was such a big fan of the Harry Potter books, I like to think of it in terms of Horcruxes.
Jason is no longer here with us but a small part of him is alive in every person who loved him. So, even though he may not be here with us physically we can still have a part of him with us when we associate with each other. He lives on in each of us. We are like his Horcruxes, anchoring fragments of his soul to the earth in the memories that we've shared with him. Every person who has a memory of Jason holds a piece of his story. I think that when we remain connected to each other we remain connected to him. That is something I can hold on to. That is something I am thankful for.
After his last Cub Scout pack meeting Hubba and I went to the Dollar Store so he could spend the dollar that he got from the tooth fairy. I was impressed that he held on to that dollar for a whole two weeks because let me tell you, he was dying to spend it.
Hubba insisted on searching every inch of every shelf in the store in case there was something better down the next aisle. This kid was not going to spend his dollar until he knew he was getting the best that the Dollar Store had to offer a 9-year-old boy. As he perused the merchandise in the store he painstakingly narrowed his purchase down to two items - a ninja set and a blow-gun that shot suction-cup darts.
He could not decide between these two treasures but he knew that he had to. I needed to pick up some treats in the candy aisle so I told him he had about a minute before we'd be at the register. As I stopped in front of the candy wall I saw the thing that my little boy will remember for a good, long time.
Someone had left a dollar in a ziplock bag with this note:
Please enjoy this random act of kindness (you deserve it). Yes, it's for you!
To say he was excited would be an understatement. This kid was ecstatic! He kept questioning why someone would do this and who did I think it was and did he really get to keep the dollar? He went home that night with both of the toys he wanted as well as a huge smile on his face. He couldn't stop talking about what had happened. Everyone still gets to hear about it. It's pretty amazing how much a dollar means to a 9-year-old boy, especially when it seemed to just magically appear.
I am thankful that there are people in this world who make time to do kind things for others.
On Sunday Little O didn't want his hair to be flat. He wanted it to be "high, like the boy who wears black glasses." I couldn't figure out who he was talking about. I went to Facebook and eventually we figured it out. He wanted to look like our neighbor Jonathan. When I asked him why he wanted tall hair like Jonathan's Little O told me, "Because he is so awesome and cool!" I did my best with his hair and then he grabbed the glasses that All-a-Boy wore on Halloween to complete the look.
I am thankful to know good people who my kids can look up to and want to emulate.
And I am so grateful to have this funny boy in our family to always keep us laughing!
Do you ever feel like you are ready to explode? This tire knows the feeling.
We have been doing some work in our back yard recently and as a result our flatbed trailer was filled with dirt and rocks (you can't get one without the other in our area). Last Saturday Allen went to unload this pile of dirt and on the way the tire decided that it had carried this load long enough, that it wasn't strong enough to keep going with such a burden of weight, and with a BOOM that sounded like a gunshot it finally just exploded. Even the rim of the tire got all bent out of shape.
Luckily we had a spare tire but the weight of the dirt and rocks was so heavy that some of the dirt had to be transferred to another trailer before we could lift the flatbed high enough to replace the blowout. A friend loaned us his trailer and before too long we were ready to go again.
I was thankful for so many things that night! I was glad that Allen was driving along a smaller highway instead of the busy freeway to his destination, that he did not lose control of the vehicle or trailer when this happened and most especially that no one got hurt throughout the whole ordeal.
As I have reflected on this whole situation I found a good lesson in it. We all carry burdens, some heavier than others. Many times we take on more than we should, thinking we can handle it. Or maybe we carry memories or secrets that weigh us down for much too long. Sometimes things keep piling up and we know we can't keep going but we do it anyway because it's what we think we're supposed to do and what we want others to think we are capable of. Eventually the burden becomes too much to bear and we can't help it, we just explode.
We are all in this together. This life is a journey and we're all traveling to the same destination, just maybe not on the same road. We need each other and that's okay. I am beyond thankful for the people in my life who help ease my burdens. I am glad to have friends who know of my many imperfections and choose to still love me unconditionally.
It brings to mind the quote, "Be kind, everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle". The man who said this also penned these words, which elaborate on the shorter version:
This man beside us also has a hard fight with an unfavouring world, with strong temptations, with doubts and fears, with wounds of the past which have skinned over, but which smart when they are touched. It is a fact, however surprising. And when this occurs to us we are moved to deal kindly with him, to bid him be of good cheer, to let him understand that we are also fighting a battle; we are bound not to irritate him, nor press hardly upon him nor help his lower self. -John Watson
When it comes to decorating our house for Halloween, we can get super crazy and go all out. And for lots of years we have. This year I remembered that we had one of those plug-in Jack-o-lanterns up in the garage loft somewhere and set it on the porch next to our un-carved pumpkins about a half hour after the first group of trick-or-treaters came by. And I felt good about that.
In other Halloween news, I helped seven of my ten favorite children put together costumes. Here they are for your viewing pleasure.
Little X started out wearing O's old firefighter outfit but then wouldn't stop putting on this pumpkin get-up from our costume bin. No matter what he wears he's adorable so it really didn't matter much.
I think the last person who wore this Prince Charming costume was Allen the Younger so it's been around for a long while! (See, Hoarders - it IS worth saving every little thing!) Little O tripped on the ginormous fake boots while trick-or-treating and skinned up his nose and forehead a little bit but he says it was worth it for the candy.
My beautiful Princess Curly. She was almost Amelia Earhart again but then the Rapunzel hat won her over. True to form, she insisted on wearing tennis shoes with the dress because they were more comfortable. Love this girl.
Hubba couldn't decide between being a ninja, a secret agent, Doctor Who or a minecraft guy. Then he saw that this Jedi costume would fit - complete with boots - and couldn't resist.
Princess really, really wanted to be a trash can for Halloween. She wanted to be the same thing last year. I was going to try to make her a trash can costume but the more I looked into it and thought about it I was worried people would think she was being 'white trash' or wonder what kind of self-esteem she had if she wanted to be a trash can. Luckily she found this pirate costume that Cowgirl wore a couple of years ago and liked it. She says she is the daughter of the Pirate Princess from Jake and the Neverland Pirates. Cool by me.
Cowgirl comes up with something unique for the past couple of years. This year she wanted to be Margo from Despicable Me. Most of the costume I was able to find around the house but I had to make the skirt and shoes. It was really getting down to the wire with the shoes - I refused to buy a $50 pair of red high top Converse for a Halloween costume and I couldn't find any at the thrift stores. The day before Halloween I checked one last time and found a pair of white Italian leather hightops for $5. With a little tape and some red spray paint they turned out perfectly. And she really did look a lot like Margo, don't you think?
All-a-Boy knew right off the bat that he wanted to be Waldo. I looked all over for a red and white striped shirt but couldn't find one. Again, tape and spray paint did the job nicely. I found the hat online and he made the cane. I had also ordered him some glasses online but they never arrived (don't always trust Amazon's delivery dates! They should have come a week before Halloween and they're still not here!) Luckily one of our neighbors had some of those 3-D glasses with the lenses popped out that they let him borrow. Thanks for saving the day Kara!
Thumbelina had no idea what she was going to be. She was almost Alice in Wonderland. Then she was almost the Mad Hatter. On Halloween eve she decided to be a Christmas tree and put together this costume. Clever girl, that one.
Elle and her cute roommates all decided to dress up with things they had in their apartment. Meriah was a ladybug, Amy was a cat and Elle was a... cowboy alien. She cracks me up!
Allen dressed in his standard attire for the two years of his mission - his white shirt and tie and the tag that proclaims his calling as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I think it's my favorite thing he's worn on Halloween. I miss him times infinity but I know he's right where he should be right now and he is loving the work.
I can't help but think today of how thankful I am to have all of these awesome people call me Mom.
I went for a little walk around my neighborhood today to enjoy the last moments of beautiful weather and autumn colors before the inevitable winter shows its chilly face. I was struck by the beauty of everything when dressed in the splendor of fall. As I continued walking I began to look beyond the trees and mountains and perfectly clear blue sky and I started to think about the people who lived in each of the homes I passed, not just now but in the past as well. I recalled stories and memories of their goodness.
She brought us cereal and put take-and-bake pizzas and milk in our fridge when we were coming home from a long vacation and had no groceries. He convinced us to seed our side yard and that's the most thick, green carpet of grass on our property. They made sure our kids were fed two days after Christmas when I broke my leg and had a baby. He brought industrial-sized fans to help dry our basement when it flooded. She always brings us cookies when she's home for a visit. They are always willing to lend me the inevitable missing ingredients from an almost-finished recipe at dinner time. He taught me a valuable lesson in unconditional love. They got Allen started with his first real job which has continued to be one of our greatest blessings.
She shares her homemade jam with me every year. She always seems to know when I need a friendly word or a smile. She has rocked at least seven of my babies to sleep at church when I'm trying to manage other things.
The list is endless, really. It made me emotional to think about how much I love where I live - and not only for the beauty that is visible but more especially for the beauty that I know exists in so many of the awesome people that surround us and, perhaps unknowingly, have become an extension of our family.
First off, commas really do change lives! You've probably all seen the examples of Let's eat, Grandma and Let's eat Grandma but yesterday I read of a real life situation on my cousin's facebook wall where someone's entire life was the result of a forgotten comma. A woman, let's call her Jane, was pregnant and got a letter from her husband serving overseas where he said, You name her Jane. She thought it odd to name the baby after her but was touched that her husband missed her and wanted the baby to share her name. Baby Jane was born and a few months later he returned home. He asked why in the world she would name the baby Jane? She showed him the letter he had written and he explained that he had meant You name her, Jane. As in, you decide on a name. Seriously, people. Commas change lives.
Nothing tops that story but here are some errors I've seen over the past few months:
This gem is located right in front of Elle's dorm.
This is posted on the door of one of All-a-Boy's classes at the high school. That's right, it is written by a teacher. I'm just glad she teaches math and not English.
Look at the description for Bistec en Rajas. I have no idea what that means and I don't want to know. Where do you think they find chunks?
I can't allow my kids to go to a school that has typos in their recruiting mailers. Even if your qualify for a scholarship.
I love you ROCK STAR. And I love how the image of the hand is stolen from shutterstock and they didn't even really try to hide it. The dollar store always has something awesome for me but this is one of my favorites.
My friends went to Boston and sent me the next few pictures from their journey. Thanks Larsons!
Come to Rhonda's house and find out why you are a great.
Every S deserves an apostrophe!
This one is just funny. No guarantees if you're shopping here!
These next three pictures are from my trip to New York a couple of weeks ago. There's no grammatical error but there's definitely something wrong going on here.
Do you need a closer look?
Your eyes do not deceive you. That's Bedtime Bear hanging from a hook in the corner of a restaurant on Broadway.
I couldn't resist asking what this was all about. What do you think? Leave your guess in a comment and I'll send (or deliver for local friends) a care package with some of my most favorite things to the first person who gets it right.
What Lies Beneath. This picture will make sense later.
I was driving around this afternoon, taking Thumbelina to an orthodontist appointment and Little O to school, when I figured I might as well go pick up some milk and finish my grocery shopping while I was out with Little X. Thumbelina said she'd just come with me to get the milk since it was now lunch time at school and she wouldn't be missing any classes or anything. So I started to head to the freeway but then something in my brain shifted and started changing plans so I decided to just take her to school after all. After dropping her off I told myself, time to get milk. But I suddenly had the thought that we would be fine without milk until tomorrow - what I needed to do was go home and eat a grilled cheese sandwich.
And then I started arguing with myself. (I know, it's embarrassing to admit, but this was really happening.) I don't want a grilled cheese sandwich. I'd have to get out the griddle and a spatula and clean them up afterwards. And I'm not really that hungry right now anyway. The thought wouldn't leave me.You want grilled cheese! You can use three pieces of cheese and cook it at a nice, low temperature and put a bowl over the top of it so the cheese melts just right while it's cooking up all golden, buttery brown. Doesn't that sound nice? Dang it, grilled cheese. Why do you have to be so delicious?
I drove toward home.
As I pulled into the driveway I noticed that Little X was asleep. I started thinking of all I could accomplish while he was having a little snooze and already had a mental list of tasks as I laid him down on my bed. I gathered a load of laundry to put in the wash and went to get my sewing machine out of the closet when the thought came to me again:grilled cheese. In a minute, I told myself, and put the laundry in the washer. I started to fold and put away the clothes in the dryer and decided to make Curly's bed for her when the thought came again: grilled cheese perfection without anyone else around to ask for a bite! I decided that I must be hungrier than I thought and went upstairs to the kitchen.
It is no secret to anyone who knows me that I do not like to clean. So, as delicious as grilled cheese was sounding I decided to bypass the extra mess and just get some pretzels from the pantry to tide me over while I finished the things I wanted to get done. As I reached for them I thought, you don't want salty, dry pretzels! Why eat something you don't even want? Just make a grilled cheese sandwich! And I thought, maybe I'll just eat a piece of cheese for now. So I opened the fridge and that was when I noticed the puddle. Not just a little puddle, but a large one. It came out from beneath the refrigerator and pooled under the cupboards all the way to the sink.
What the heck? I wondered. I got some towels out and dried up the mess but saw that the water continued to puddle out from beneath the fridge. There was a leak somewhere. I pulled down the stuff from the top of the fridge and pulled it out just far enough to get a peek. All I saw was wet.
I pulled the fridge out all the way and noticed a teensy spray of water shooting out of a teensy little hole in the water line to our fridge. My first thought was to call Allen. But my second, almost simultaneous thought was to fix this myself. I traced the water line back to the sink and found a little shutoff valve on it. Righty-tighty I told myself and sure enough the water stopped spraying. All that was left was to clean up the mess.
Do you remember the last time you cleaned beneath your refrigerator? Me either. I forgot how much dust and trash and junk can accumulate under there. Imagine a whole nation of dust bunnies with a 10 year collection of paper scraps, lost toys, forgotten pennies and random ABC refrigerator magnets... all soaked in water. It looked like swamp sludge with cheap kiddie prizes mixed in. Gross.
Two hours later, I am proud to say that the mess is cleaned up. I even salvaged some of the prizes much to the delight of Little X who spent a good half hour telling me what they were and thanking me for each one.
Why do I call this a modern day miracle? Because our kitchen has flooded before. The size of the puddle that had accumulated was manageable. If I had gone shopping for groceries like I had planned then chances are Cowgirl would have come home to a much bigger puddle while I was out running errands and picking kids up from school. I would have rushed home with a whole van full of kids to keep out of the kitchen while I cleaned up the mess - which likely would have caused some water damage to the floor after sitting for so long.
I have learned that miracles happen all the time these days but people have stopped seeing them as such. I try to always recognize God's hand in my life and I have no doubt that this was a time when He was there for me. I know that in a few days, maybe even by tomorrow, I would have discounted this whole experience as coincidence. This is why I write such things down. I need to remember.
Could something as silly as a sudden craving for a grilled cheese sandwich have somehow come to mind by divine intervention and saved me from Major Flooding of the Kitchen, Part 2?
You can think I'm crazy or whatever else - but I say yes. Absolutely.
Maybe tomorrow I'll have time for that grilled cheese sandwich.
This has been the most rainy autumn I remember. I love it.
When people post a picture and add 'hashtag-no-filter' I have no idea what that means. Does it mean people usually put some find of filter on their pictures? The only filter I own is the one in my furnace and I just remembered that it probably needs to be cleaned. Dang. Hashtag-dirty-filter.
Is it just me or does everyone else get asked, "So, any fun plans today?" by cashiers and sales clerks at stores when there's a lull in the conversation and they're feeling awkward? I am usually not feeling awkward until they ask that. It's like an I'm Feeling Awkward Alert. Are they trained to ask that question or do you think they all thought of it independently? I think they should be trained to offer compliments instead. No, even better - if they can't think of anything to say they should offer discounts! Now we're talking!
I saw an article somewhere recently that said that the going price for a lost tooth these days was up near $4. FOUR DOLLARS. What?? I remember what I used to get whenever I lost a tooth - a Canadian dime. Your guess is as good as mine as to why I was getting Canadian money, but I don't remember caring either way because a Canadian dime worked in the prize machines outside of the grocery store and as long as I came away with my handful of Chiclets or Sixlets it was all good.
So... is the tooth fairy Canadian? Also, Chiclets are a gross excuse for gum. And Sixlets are not real chocolate. I am older and wiser and have real taste buds now.
Living vicariously through your kids is something you're not supposed to do but most of the time it can be pretty awesome. However, I am discovering that it can also be pretty heart-wrenching when you see them experiencing things you would rather forget ever having gone through.
I wish other kids (and adults!) could see my kids through my eyes. Awesomeness is their superpower but most of them keep it hidden away and all anyone sees is their alter-egos. Which are also pretty awesome, actually. But what do I know? I'm just their biased mother.
Being a mom to these 10 kids of mine is the best thing I'll ever do, I'm pretty sure. There is no fame or fortune or anything else that can replace motherhood for me.
That being said, there is still a whole mental list of things I want to do in my life and I'm not even close to completing it.
Regardless of how long I stand and stare at what's in the pantry, it never makes itself into dinner.
I can not spend less than an hour at our local thrift store. Even when I tell myself that I'm only going to go in and see if I can find just that one book or basket or shirt or whatever, there are too many treasures to be found and I can't leave without a quick run-through to my favorite sections of the store.
I've discovered that I almost always like thrift store clothes better than what I can find at the mall. The best part is that they've been washed at some point so they're already shrunk down to post-wash size and I don't have to worry about them shrinking too much after purchase.
I can not stop watching this video lately:
or listening to the song. I see the darker-haired guy as Josh Groban every time I watch it and that makes it even better. (He's pretty much Josh's Norwegian twin. Look at the guy. You know it's true.) I think Josh Groban should do a cover of this song, actually. That would be awesome.
The Fox song is so catchy that even Little X can sing the chorus.
Even while eating enchiladas! (I told you awesomeness was a superpower around here.)
I generally try to avoid politics and discussions about politics because I know that not everyone thinks the same way I do and I don't like to offend my friends. Actually, the main reason I avoid talking about politics is because I don't feel like I have enough knowledge to defend my opinions in the inevitable discussion which follows.
So. That being said, I saw this on a friend's Facebook wall a while ago and the discussion I read in the comments was one that I was reluctant to chime in on because I wasn't sure I was understanding both sides. I decided that my own little corner of the blogosphere was a better place to share the video and clarify my understanding of what is being said, as well as sharing my own story.
So first, watch this:
And now for my questions.
Why does it matter what 5,000 people (a pretty tiny percentage of US citizens) think the distribution of wealth is? It is what it is, right? People thinking it's different doesn't mean anything significant, does it?
What exactly does "redistribution of wealth" mean? I picture Robin
Hood, taking from the rich and giving to the poor. That doesn't seem
right to me. I understand that some people think that the wealthiest Americans should make less money and the poorest Americans should make more money. But how? I don't understand how this would happen or who should get to decide how it would happen, if it ever did. Isn't that something we choose based on the decisions we make?
Here is what I know.
I was born into a family where both of my parents were Deaf and ended their formal education after high school. They both worked hard for most of the years I was at home in order to provide for our family of 6. Mom was a seamstress and did data entry. Dad worked as a pipefitter, custodian, plumber, and anything else that helped him to support our family. I had two older siblings and one younger brother. Times were often tough but we were mostly happy and always found a way to provide for each other. My siblings and I were never encouraged to attend college because my parents never felt it was necessary.
When I left home I was the first in my family to do so. I drove from California to Utah in a 1976 Dodge Aspen that my parents helped me pay $500 for. The day I arrived I went to the local university and community college and found myself two jobs as a sign language interpreter. I worked 60 hours a week and provided for myself. It was empowering.
Allen comes from a family of sixteen kids who were raised by two supportive parents that cared for their family on a school teacher's salary. His mom never worked outside of the home. They always had what they needed because his parents knew how to budget their money and taught their kids how to save. They never felt poor. The kids all learned to work together. His parents encouraged all of their kids to get good grades and move on to college after graduating from high school, so they did.
When we got married, Allen and I both worked while we were going to college. I continued to interpret while Allen worked wherever the pay was decent. At first he worked on campus. In the summers he painted houses. After a while he got a job at a food manufacturing company, and then for a company who produced high-end speaker systems. He did janitorial work. At one point between jobs he worked at Jiffy Lube because it was the only place that was hiring. We had a couple of kids and took care of our little family. It wasn't always easy, but we made things work. I shopped for clothes at thrift stores. I planned my menus according to what items were on sale at the grocery store. I stopped attending school so I could be home with the kids more. I worked days while Allen worked nights. I took jobs at restaurants and golf courses when interpreting work wasn't available. Things always seemed to work out with thoughtful planning on our part.
We dreamed of buying a house but couldn't afford it. One day we went
for a long drive and found a little town that most people haven't heard of, about 90 minutes away,
where houses were very affordable. We put a small down payment on an $18,000
house and Allen commuted an hour and a half each way to work for a year. Allen fixed up the yard and remodeled the house on weekends. After a few
years we were able to sell the house for enough of a profit to make a
down-payment on a house back in the place where we wanted to raise our
family.
When our third child, Thumbelina, was only 8 months old she had to have major cranial surgery due to cranial synostosis. Allen was out of work when this happened and had to continue his job hunt in the middle of it all so he wouldn't miss any opportunities that might come. Thankfully I had insurance through the school district I was working
for, but we still had a large portion left to pay after her long
hospital stay. We worked hard and paid what we could each month until we finally took care of that debt. We took out student loans when we needed to and paid them back on our own. We had yard sales and even sold a few things to a pawn shop. At one point I taught accordion lessons on Saturdays to bring in a little extra cash.
School was sort of an off-and-on thing for Allen, which was part of the reason his jobs weren't the most high paying. We recognized that this needed to change and we decided to work together to make school a priority for him. Allen carefully chose his field of study and after many years of determination and juggling schedules he got his degree. It was not always easy but we knew that in the end Allen could better provide for the large family we hoped to fill our home with.
Allen graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1999 and found a job with the company he is still working for today. (Pretty much the best, most family-oriented company on the planet. I wish everyone I like could work there.)
Did we have to work hard to get where we are? Yes, we did. And we continue to do so. So here's the part I guess I don't get. Wherever we are on the scale of Poor to Rich, isn't that where we deserve to be? And if the guy who makes more money than he even knows what to do with chose his profession or lucked out or worked like crazy to get there, doesn't he deserve it, too?
I really would love to hear what you think about this, whether you agree with me or not, because I am trying to understand both sides. I really am.
