Renaissance Faire

Our last trip to the Renaissance Fair, May 2013

Years ago, attending the Renaissance Faire was a yearly thing for our family. We went to see magic shows, to hear fantastic stories, to dress up in our own Renaissance costumes, and most importantly, to see real live JOUSTING! There were homeschool days and the whole family could go for around $10. We would spend the whole day at the fair, even bringing as close as we could come to a renaissance picnic. Then, the brave souls who did the jousting went away. (To where, we don't know - perhaps they became less brave...? I hope it wasn't that they injuring themselves doing something as insane as JOUSTING. The replacement was amatuers whom they taught to joust over a couple of days who would then "compete" but never with as much flair or skill.) And the fair lost it's appeal. Suddenly, it was something we had been to see, something we had already done, only it never measured up to our memories. And so we stopped going.

Which worked fine because the end of May, when it always fell, had been an insane time for our family for several years.

THIS year, I realized Arthur didn't remember going. Eloise, only vaguely. This May was not overly insane. AND this year I saw that they brought back jousting. Real jousting with a touring group, NOT amateurs.

Gone was the homeschool days and homeschool discount. Still, I called about arranging a group discount and discovered there was a family discount AND we could get 1/2 off if we were in costume. It came to around $22 and that seemed worth it to see real jousting again.

Kai had to miss this time - he was in class on Saturdays. But we told him he could take the train to Ogden and we'd pick him up when he was done and when we were done. It was a plan!!

It was something I was really looking forward to too. And then my knee began to give out. But by the morning of Saturday, May 25, it was doing OK and I thought I could handle it with a cane. Of course, I didn't want to hobble about with a cane in a dress, so I was the civilian with a family of time travelers, and we went to the Renaissance Fair.

Eloise with the princess who was captured in the show,
and her horse.

AND it was not real jousting. I should just say that right out of the chute. It was an entertaining "show" of jousting. Far too many women for my taste. The fights were scripted and choreographed. The script made Q laugh. He said it sounded like something highschool boys would write. The acting was not much better. The fight choreography was clear choreography. It DID inspire Evelyn and Eloise that they could do the same, and they did! (They made up their own extended fight scene which was pretty inventive and LONG which they practiced on the front lawn - much to the amusement or horror of the neighbors and passing cars - until they realized they were both allergic to so much contact with the grass.) Anyway, nothing is ever as good as a memory, and in this case, it was really so. BUT perhaps for Arthur who had no memory, or for Eloise who may not have had a discerning memory, it was fun enough.

They've all made decent money helping when the house is rented on Airbnb, so at long last, we were able to buy some SOUVENIRS! Arthur got a sword, Eloise got a parasol, and I got a snood (which is a fancy hairnet that is great for any woman's costume, practically, from the Renaissance period all the way to the pioneer period).

The princesses at our picnic.

We still had our period picnic, though a touch less fancy than past years, simply for my limited ability to prepare on a bum leg. Instead of a cold rotisserie chicken, we bought a gigantic "turkey leg," which is really a pig leg, according to Q, which I had not remembered tasted so poor. So I guess my tongue remembers better days too. Q found us an excellent picnic spot under someone's unused easy up. We were out of the sun, and later, even out of a few raindrops that fell, if memory serves. Q was very helpful overall too. I just hobbled from one location to another and sat.

Me sitting, with a knight on my knee.

So I sat to see a some-what skilled, somewhat funny magic show. It was a dad with some kids in their teens. They were supposed to be gypsies from Scotland, and the part that was most amusing to me was the name of one son, Seamus (said "shame us.") And I suppose it was hilarious to me because the kid quite believing played up his dimwitted character, which seemed to shame his father. I wish they'd done more comedy with that interaction. So most of us were entertained, but I think Eloise and Arthur got a bit restless at it. Then I sat to listen to a very interesting presentation about swords through history. For me, this was perhaps the most skilled, informative, and therefore interesting part of the fair, BUT Eloise and Arthur were not especially engaged so we didn't last long there.

They roamed further afield and came back with tales of giant women in tails. And I finally did see them myself, though I had the courage to look away. Very big women in their 20's had put on mermaid tails and bikini tops and were hanging around in tanks of water. It grossed everyone in my family out, but Eloise was equally fascinated and hung out by the tank for a while. They had colored hair and strange make-up and were awkward performers, if you can imagine the type. They certainly left an impression and the memory gave Quent and EV the heebie jeebies for days.

The other disappointment of the fair was it's location: right off of I-15 with, not only the noise of the freeway, but right under a huge screen advertising some mini-golf and amusement park. So the ambiance and charm was lacking too. It made me wonder what happened, who ran it all, what was management like (the ticket takers themselves did not know about the family discount, though they honored what the lady on the phone told me - THANKFULLY because this was NOT WORTH full price). So while it was less impressive, it remained, as it had been in years past, a cultural experience.

The charm and authenticity were diminished, but one could still be curious about those who DID come, who paid full price, who wanted to be in the show, or in mermaid garb, who not only were there when we were there, but who were there for the full run of 3 weekends, and who then might follow the "train" off to another location to do it all again. I suppose I'm always fascinated by being the stranger in a foreign land, and at this, and all Renaissance Fairs we've been to, we certainly are. (Just adding that it REALLY makes me want to go to a good one, and I hear there IS one in Phoenix....)

Lagoon at Last

It is not as though Lagoon is water that quenches some sort of life-sustaining thirst. It is an amusement park. But you might be easily confused and mistake one for the other if you had been in the car the many, many, many times my family passed Lagoon along I-15 on the way to Salt Lake City and heard my children pining for it like they might plead for something to quench their thirst.

"When are we going to Lagoon?" "Mom, I really really want to go to Lagoon? Can we go?"

Four years ago my answer was, "We aren't going to Lagoon because we are going to Taiwan."

The year after that I could still say, "We just went to Taiwan."

When that excuse faded, I answered, "We can't go to Lagoon because we are going to Seattle for a month."

And then, "We'll go to Lagoon when we aren't flying to the east coast to travel around seeing the sites there for nearly 7 weeks."

That year when we weren't going anywhere else finally came, and I might have come up with another excuse, but the Easter Bunny saved my children from death by Lagoon deprivation and got them tickets. We finally went to the precious Lagoon on May 29, 2019. It might have helped the Easter Bunny make the purchase that this was a school day which meant tickets were only $35 instead of $69, and that parking was free, AND that one of us got a chaperone pass so he only paid for 5 passes. For us, it meant Lagoon was PACKED with high schoolers who let everyone from their school in line in front of us. But we coped.

I was still recovering from multiple knee collapses, so I brought my cane and hobbled from ride to ride. Last time we went, Quent was working for Chem-Dry and we had returned from our epic trip to Florida. Because it took him so long to recover from motion sickness from the flight and cruise, he opted to sit out from the rides and stay with tiny Arthur. 

Thankfully, this time, he was ready and rearin' to go, because kids were too. Eloise was tall enough to ride everything and Arthur was tall enough AND gutsy enough to ride most of it. So I acted as the person from their school (and I am, after-all) and as soon as they got far enough through the line of one ride, I would leave them to go get in the back of another. This system worked pretty well, and in our hours there - from just after 9am to 4pm, they were able to ride upwards of 15 rides WITH a break for

I'm surrounded by TEENS!

lunch AND a break for a huge downpour and hail storm. (This May has been delightfully cool and rainy, but I think a few other school Lagoon days had been postponed for the weather, and that may have contributed to the place CRAWLING with teens.)

Perhaps most delightful to me in our time there was that MY teen got to come too! Thankfully, THIS year his "end of year performances" took place mid-May and his exams were the following week. So we had Kai excused from class and picked him up on our way to Lagoon - he lived with Freestone's family only about 10 minutes from there - and drop him off on our way back home.

It was quite a day. We brought an enormous picnic so we didn't have to spend any money on, or time buying food. It hit the spot because we had to get up pretty early to get Kai and get to Lagoon by 9am and most of us didn't have much of a breakfast. And, thankfully, there was plenty of left-overs because when the rains began to fall, eating again was another way to kill time.

Kai's pose is a typical ballet kid pose, which he thinks is hilarious when boys do it. It does look pretty silly. :)

When it began to rain, the Kai, EV, and Eloise had just gotten in line for Cannibal. I waited for them under a covered eating spot near the gift shop while Q to Arthur on a near-by ride. They said by the time they got ON Cannibal, the rain was falling so hard, they couldn't really open their eyes on the ride. When we connected back up with Quent and Arthur, the rain was coming down harder, so we found shelter in a pavilion and I sent Q back for our lunch, which though we'd left just under a tree, was not too far from where we were.

And it was a blessing he went and got it when he did because when he returned, it began to pour like it almost never does in Utah. But we snacked. And then we put on the ponchos I'd had the good sense to bring. (That was another huge blessing - just a quite whispering of "bring the ponchos" - and though the prompting was ever-so-faint, I followed it.) So the kids, armed with "protective rain gear," hit another ride - one of the only ones still running - and did the Flying Aces in the downpour, which might have made that ride more fun. 

Our large pavilion was now packed with drenched teens, filling with huge puddles of water from the run off, and everyone was shouting because the racket the hail on the metal room was making. Thankfully the storm lasted only about 15 or 20 minutes. As it began to let up, again, relatively dry in our ponchos, I took all the kids and headed for the Cannibal line. Before the storm, the wait had been nearly an hour. But the torrents had driven even the most adventurous for cover, and I wanted to beat them all back to the line.

We did! Not all, but we were within a few feet and behind only a few dozen when we got back in line. I still had my cane, but the kids had been raving consistently enough about the ride, and Arthur wanted to go, so I thought I'd store the cane while I was ON this ride and give it a try. After waiting for about 10 minutes, as the line in front of us swelled with "friends" and the ride behind us began to stack, I sent Arthur through the pack of teens to measure himself by the ride's entrance. I thought if he was too short, we'd exit the line before waiting longer. When he was tall enough, the teens erupted into a cheer for him, and that was fun. The ride was still closed - I think they needed to wait 20 minutes after the last thunder before they could re-open? And we joined a few chants to open the ride. When the worker at last came to open the gate, there was a huge cheer.

Q and I on the ski-lift style ride, catching a ride from one end
of the park to the other.

By now, it had stopped raining, so we were able to enjoy Cannibal fully. And boy was it enjoyed! Arthur talked about it for DAYS. In fact, he is STILL talking about it. We were all impressed that he was brave enough, and he was impressed he was tall enough. I was even impressed with Eloise, whose bravery we may have taken for granted because she is so very tall. But at OLDER than her age, I was too scared to go on the Colossus. (They DO still have that ride: a roller coaster with two upside-down loops, and right as Quent and ALL the kids were SEATED ON the ride, they closed it for technical issues. That was their first ride of the day. So thankfully I was in the Wild Mouse ride holding their spot, which nearly made up for it. And by then, I'd seen all the line butting first hand and decided I'd continue to help my crew in that way, so I left them to ride Wild Mouse and got in line for Wicked.)

Absolute total bravery champ!

Anyway, with Arthur riding nearly all the rides, and Kai being completely capable of being autonomous, we had a pretty fun time dividing our group and conquering Lagoon. Except for Colossus, the kids pretty much rode everything they wanted to. I was able to hit my favorites, even with a cane. I love the belly tickles on Tidal Wave, but when Arthur needed to be near the middle of the boat, I sacrificed and rode with him there. When we were younger, Q and I loved Turn of the Century - a merry-go-round style ride that rises and spins you flying in a swing - but that one nearly made me ill. (Getting old!) My favorite still, to me even more thrilling than Cannibal, is The Rocket's Re-Entry. I love the free-fall from such a height. Arthur WAS too short to go on this one. But I guess that means we'll need to come back next year!

Ah, the smiles! Q was teasing the people around him by talking loudly about how he "barfed the last time he rode this ride." Their nervousness greatly amused MY kids. I lead an obnoxious "Yay!" cheer long after the ride had slowed down, which mostly amused Quent.

Love on the Rocks

Love birds at the Grand Canyon in January 2019

Journaling about problems in one's marriage is hard enough, let alone BLOGGING about it. What to say when issues are private, but when you feel your world is crumbling? That is the dilemma I faced in May. This was a rough patch that was the roughest and longest it's been. It's the untold story of what ELSE was happening in our lives in May. Why things were absolutely more over-whelming than ever.

It began the day before Mother's Day and lasted through Friday, May 24. It stretched over and through Mother's Day, a ballet banquet, babysitting my niece, private lessons, camping, Quent's birthday, piano, ballet, AND voice recitals. All sorts of events that were supposed to be celebrations. All with family and extended family and congratulations and smiles, and through it all I wasn't sure I could make it THROUGH it all.

What transpired is not for this record. But I do want to record that life is hard sometimes. When we come out the other side and the history has been written with a happy ending, it is easy to forget the darkness and fear we felt in the living of life. Worse than mis-remembering for ourselves, however, is painting a false picture for our kids and their kids that we always had things figured out, that our lives were smooth sailing. It's not a true story, but it's not a very inspiring one either.

The facts are for 2 weeks, things were rough. I finally went in for counseling. 'Finally' in that this was not the first time I had wanted to GET counseling. And? It helped. I knew going in that the only person I could change was me. But I didn't see how I COULD change my perception that something was wrong and needed fixing. Blessedly, what I learned I needed to change was my willingness to speak. There are all kinds of things I'm not perfect at as a wife, but the thing I needed to do to find peace was to express my perspective and hold my ground. It may sound incredible that someone as wordy, even verbose, as I am has been afraid of speaking. I think my fear was that speaking wouldn't make things better. I've probably lived enough examples of seeing how speaking made it worse.

Here we are at a ballet banquet on May 14. Together. Smiling. Out of habit and out of hope.

I needed to speak not because my perspective was the only perspective, not because my words had any power to change the past, and I doubted they would have any power over the future either. And yet, there were things which needed to be spoken, feelings which needed to be heard to be considered. So finally on Friday, May 24, I held my ground and spoke my truth.

For Quent's part, he had been miserable during this time too. Neither of us like friction in our marriage. My words had the potential to make things worse. They were words of boundaries. They were definite about right and wrong. I didn't expect them to help. But perhaps I should have had more hope. The man I married IS a decent human being who never set out to hurt or disregard his wife. In our long drive and conversation, he listened to me, and I listened to him. We disagreed, but we heard each other. We DID agree that there were things we could both do better. We decided to keep trying because we loved each other and neither of us wanted things NOT to work.

So while many of these entries in May felt like a lovely facade over a cracking foundation, I'm so glad we held it together. We have fortified the foundation NOW, but even amidst the tremors, we held on. We went, we smiled, we clapped, we took pictures. We kept working on making something beautiful of life, perhaps just on faith that the future COULD be beautiful. And now there are these lovely memories to look back on, and maybe they are all the more lovely to know they are built on something imperfect, but worth saving.

Steff's Knee Chronicles

With my previous posts, I've been at a disadvantage writing because the events transpired over a month ago. In THIS post, I have the advantage of passing time to paint a fuller picture.

As my blog, Boston Bound, chronicles, I put my knee out in June of last year. The injury, which occurred by me merely stepping to the side, happened after almost 2 weeks of me teaching full-time at the CVCB Summer Intensive (which I also directed in 2017 and 2018). Last year, all leading up to it, I kept getting the feeling that I should physically prepare - work out - so that my body could meet the increased demand. BUT the other preparations crowded out my physical prep. Pulling the intensive off is no small task in the first place, and I was adding to it preparing my home for airbnb guests during the summer, and 4 weeks in Boston followed by 2.5 weeks in NYC, Philadelphia, Washington DC, and Williamsburg, VA. ADDED to my full-time job of being a mother. (Typing this out sure brings a measure of peace. For a year, I've wondered, "why did I not heed that prompting to exercise?" And if it was a prompting, I'm sure God would have provided a way. BUT it would have been an extraordinary addition to ALL I was juggling.) Sometimes I look back and wonder how in the world I have done so much!

So I put my knee out. Not out sufficiently to flag anyone I was able to see about it. I saw two chiropractors, the first who seemed to make it worse and the second that made it no better. And had no time nor money to do better for it before I was off for 6.5 weeks adventuring around the east coast. Suffering from knee issues all the way.

By the time I got home, I had developed ways to cope - I changed my gait - and ever since have just survived. Still thinking about my knee with almost every step. Just getting by.

That began to change when the trailer purchase was falling apart/coming together. That knee seize then was a new thing - a complete inability to straighten my leg. By then, I had refound my chiropractor who SKILLFULLY adjusts my knee. After the initial seize, I was able to get the knee moving again, and I began to see him in earnest to figure it out. (I found him in December, when I put my shoulder out. Again, my sense was that somehow there were a few tendons that had not found their place, and no one else was able to see or confirm this theory, let alone repair it. I saw a gal for massage and another chiropractor at that time with no luck. But my desperation and pain were intense and finally prompted the more desperate search which lead, at last, to re-finding Dr. Tuft.)

So I was able to get it adjusted. But it kept slipping out - seizing and leaving me limping more severely for days at a time. Dr. Tuft and I began digging a little deeper. He did further muscle tests and found my glutes weren't firing, muscles in my abs weren't either. He re-engaged these and there was improvement. AND STILL no answers.

Then, when my knee seized in the trailer at Lodge, it seemed to be the beginning of it being more out than in. Despite seeing Dr. Tuft regularly now, despite the muscles now doing their thing, and finally despite Dr. Tuft telling me my knee HAD quit slipping out of alignment, the knee was STILL grabbing. I was falling now. It would seize without weight on it, mid stride, and I would collapse to the floor in fear.

At this time, I had begun to teach ballet daily. The classes at Cache Valley School of Ballet had ended on May 11 with recitals, and I was trying to keep my private students in working order while they prepared for their summer programs. Two of my students are going to University of Utah. Another two are going to Boston for Boston Ballet's programs in Boston and Newton. Not only did the dancers need to maintain, but they needed help to IMPROVE and finally there was the studio availability to help them. The money I was making was nice too. But how frustrating that more and more was being spent on keeping my body well enough to teach! And I was able to teach to my satisfaction less and less, spending more time in a chair at the front of the room and just verbalizing corrections instead of really being able to work with the dancers' bodies.

One morning, around May 21 I think, I woke up early, around 4:30am, with pain in my knee. Laying there in the silent stillness, I had the peace and pressence and time to reflect on my life. I asked, "why am I teaching if I can barely walk?" and "how will I successfully parent if all my time and best body energy is spent teaching?" Then I began to ask, "What if I don't teach?" and I really liked the answers. I would have time for my kids! I would have time to manage the other stresses like renting the house on Airbnb. Stopping teaching immediately seemed like a necessity for my knee. It would mean a hit of about $1k. And I knew that so much time was still needed to pull the intensive together. I wondered if my knee would be well enough by August to teach. And if it wasn't, that would mean ALL the time I gave to the ballet would be a loss because I'm ONLY paid for teaching. Yet, how could I not teach at the Intensive? THAT hit would be about $4k. When Q finally woke up around 5:30am I told him my thoughts. I was nervous that he wouldn't be happy. We needed the money. We'd just spent $4k on van repair. But instead of hesitating, or telling me he thought I could suck it up and be strong, he just listened.

"I want to stop teaching," I said.

"Because of your knee?" he asked.

"Yes. I don't see how I can teach if I can't walk. But I'm worried about money. But I don't think I can keep doing this."

"OK," he said. And that was it! We talked about the Intensive in August.  I wasn't ready to let go. I didn't want to say good-bye to $4k. I hoped to give myself a week to see how my body did. I thought with the extra time to take care of ME and diminished stress, I might just feel like teaching full time in August for 3 weeks was possible.

So I cancelled my private classes and told myself the Intensive would work out. My students were disappointed in the cancelled classes, but I felt relieved and more free. The move seemed dramatic and the decision prompted me to finally make an appointment with an orthopedic doctor - a move that was probably LONG overdue. But now I needed answers and so did my students. My appointment was set for May 24.

Then on May 23, without warning, my knee seized again. I was moving in my bathroom, from sitting on the side of the tub to rounding the corner to put something in the trash when it grabbed and I collapsed. Inside, something snapped too. "Enough!" I thought. I crawled to the carpet in my bedroom, called for a kid to bring me my computer and phone, and began cutting my ties to the ballet.

I had worried about letting the Intensive go. Who would take it over? Would I ever get it back? But I found clarity pretty fast. Vivian Taylor, a teacher who had taught at it with me ever since the beginning could manage. It wouldn't be exactly MY Intensive, but that didn't matter. It didn't matter that I never directed it again. Maybe I didn't want to anyway! I called the board president, I called Vivian, I began sharing documents and schedules and contacts. I spent the next few hours letting go emotionally and quite literally. And it felt GREAT! A gigantic weight lifted.

The next day Ben Seale told me I had likely torn my meniscus and ordered an MRI. Dr. Tuft had done multiple tests on my meniscus and had assured me multiple times he did NOT think it was torn. But this orthopedic, after minimal physical exam and mostly just discussing my symptoms, DID. He was 90% sure. And I liked the pat answer and the pat solution.

Over the next bit of time, my knee did NOT get better, but that confirmed I was doing the right thing. NOT teaching was the right thing. Though I was scared for me knee, I felt it was a gift for my life: a solid reason to pivot. Now I could focus on my kids, on being with them, on homeschooling with them. With any extra time and energy I could write my books that have been eternally on back burners. I wouldn't have to juggle being in the trailer during our Airbnb stays with the commitment to be in the ballet studio. I would have time for my body - I could MAKE time. My body clearly needed it! And Q and I could work together on our mutual goals instead of me funding some and he funding others. Maybe this would strengthen our marriage too!

Into all of this hope crept the idea that it may not be a torn meniscus. I began talking to people who had torn theirs to get a sense of what was in store for me, and their experiences just didn't match up with mine. Without the MRI, it was anyone's guess what was going on. But I knew that either way, I'd need some help to strengthen my body, so I finally KEPT the appointment I'd made for myself with the physical therapist Q likes and got  in to him on June 7. I'll note here that I had been feeling like I should see him. This was actually the 4th appointment I'd made to get in. But one appointment I'd given to Q. Another I'd given to Kai. And cancelled a 3rd because family things came up. I have just not done very well at making ME and MY needs the priority.

He examined me more closely than the orthopedic doc too, and told me he'd put money on it NOT being a torn meniscus. He DID have the advantage of some insight I'd had on my knee as well. Before going to see HIM, I noticed that I could not roll through my foot in a stride. I hypothesized that I had been swinging my lower leg to the side of my body because it was uncomfortable to bring it straight through. Then I was stepping on it, toe first, but on the outside of my foot instead of the center. No wonder my knee was struggling to find decent alignment! He added to this insight that my ankle had lost mobility and that I had no strength in my quad or butt. So he worked my calf to get my ankle to move, and worked a trigger point in my thigh that he theorized might be causing various muscles within my quad to fire randomly, pulling my knee cap every which way. He ALSO massaged right into the joint of my knee. Almost all of this was VERY painful. But immediately after his work, my leg felt much improved! He gave me a bunch of exercises, which of course, I have modified. I don't sense that he works with women often, nor does he trust that I know my body as well as he does. But I am making progress with what he asked me to do. AND my knee has not seized since.

But the pain remained.

So I finally DID get the MRI on June 18. It was shorter than I expected: 20 minutes instead of an hour. But no one told me about the noise. I did great, but I laughed to myself that if anyone had WANTED to invent audio torture, they could not have done much better than an MRI machine. If I'd known, I would have brought my OWN earplugs to add to the earphones they provided, especially since I couldn't hear the classical music they were playing!

Then I waited for a week to hear from the orthopedic. AND.... No meniscus tears. No tears of any kind! And given the improvement I saw after one appointment with a physical therapist, I shouldn't be surprised. By the time I heard from the doc, I'd been back to see the PT another time. This time we went in for Kai, to work on the shoulder he put out sleeping in the bunk in the trailer. But the PT worked on me too, and told me he would not have been able to get movement back in my joint if it had been a meniscus tear.

So that was the good news. The bad news was arthritis. And that seemed like very bad news to me. No surgery was going to magically restore my knee, unless it was MAJOR surgery. And that seemed inevitable: a knee replacement in my future. In the meantime, he was talking about hyaluronic acid injections. None of it sounded good. And the pain, despite it all, seemed ever present.

I realized, at long last, the emotional toll that this past year has taken. I posted about it on Facebook. Here is what I wrote:

Until 2 days ago I didn't realize how much my sense of self-worth/beauty was tied to my PHYSICAL sense of self - how it felt to inhabit and move in my body. Makes total sense that I have been wired this way, as a dancer. But struggling to walk over the past year has been struggling to be the me I know. And I've been diagnosed with arthritis now and I'm really tottering on my identity crumbling. Not because I can't dance. I haven't danced for years and mostly don't miss it. But because the me I remember, the inside me, the muscle memory, all of ME that is me to me (and that I thought would come back if I could just figure it out) may be gone forever. Sharing my inner process not to solicit advise on meditation, diet, treatment, fatih, or anything else. Just needing love despite what probably looks on the outside like an over-blown reaction to what might otherwise be called getting old.

The love came! Friends sent so many expressions of hope and empathy. MOST significant by far was Quent's. He came home mid-day to take me on a drive to tell me how much he loved me and that he thought I was beautiful. He even brought me a huge bouquet of roses! I had actually reached out to him via email asking for just this sort of help, but he had not seen it yet. Inspired! Later, he responded to my Facebook post this way: 

Dear sexy Steff. I LOVE YOU! From your beautiful head down to your sexy scarred knees. 
This may be because those banged up knees helped you follow your heart to become a dancer, despite the odds, and achieve the goals you dreamed about since you were a tiny little girl.
Your imperfect knees are a symbol of your epic battle that you won! Just like Thor's lost eye/eyepatch after he battled Hela and ultimately won the day (until he replaced it with a bionic eye for some reason).
And just like Thor, you may someday replace your knees with super sexy bionic robocop knees with jetpacks and lasers and even more practical and less cool stuff I can't think of right now.

I love your fun, intelligent, sexy soul. Your cuteness. Your awkward jokes. The fun we have. The big ideas we talk about. Your own personal semi-Mormon theology. The "passionate stickler" you are in our house with our kids as their enforcer/teacher/mom. (see last Facebook note).
Your support for me and our kids to be our best selves and follow our big dreams in life.
You live life on your own terms and rarely take no for an answer when going after what you want and I love you for that.

You're the perfect woman for me in so many ways. You're my arm candy I proudly take out and about, but also my brain candy, and soul candy.
Love,
Q

So I am doing better! I have hope, inspired by the stories of my amazing friends who are as young as I am and MORE active than I am, who have also been told they have arthritis. And most blessedly, I have the support and love of my husband. He is so health-conscious. Much of what he has already learned is probably what I need. Certainly, it is a blessing to have ME care about longevity and quality of life as much as he does. 

We will see what the future holds. My orthopedic has already called after meeting with us, to tell me that he would like to refer me to a specialist. I think we'll go, just to be informed about ALL the options. One way or another, whether through making better heath choices, or surgery, or both I hope to look back on this as a major blessing. In many ways - the increased love from Q, the choice to stop teaching and the simplification that has brought, the motivation to take care of ME - it already IS a major blessing.

Camping at Lodge - Our Maiden Voyage

Though the trailer was purchased in March, it took us all the way until May 16 to use it. Getting it ready, familiarizing ourselves with an appliance of this size, was no simple task. Thankfully, Quent has mostly taken this on. He has been great about this role, and I have been sufficiently overwhelmed with Airbnb prep anyway, so it works out. (Our videos of the instruction we got when we bought it have been helpful too and we've referenced them more than once.)

So after we filled the fresh water tanks, and put chemicals into the grey and black water tanks, and filled the propane tank, and tried and failed to get the fridge running, and finally figured it out, and stocked it with food, and clothes, and sleeping bags, and tools, and camping chairs, and miscellaneous supplies, and hunted down a place to go, and hooked it up to Quent Sr.'s truck, and hauled it up, and got it parked, and leveled, WE WERE READY!

And then the rains came.

May had been so beautiful and pleasant and right about the evening of May 17, there was a cold snap and 2 days of rain. But it didn't matter because WE WERE IN A TRAILER!

The Lodge Campground was fantastic. It is off the beaten path, away from the noise of the road, by a stream, and has a small loop of only a few sights but there are dumpsters and a bathroom. Score! It is also only about 15 minutes up the canyon which worked well for us - I was able to conveniently come back into town after only 1 night to pick up our milk delivery and do some work in the yard. (Our house was rented on Airbnb through May 19.)

And the trailer has been a huge hit on so many levels. It was warm and dry despite the rain and cold. AND the bed was so much better than an air mattress! That was a miracle story. The mattress it came with was thin and flimsy. Dianne and I had brainstormed solutions we'd hoped would make Q Sr. more comfortable. Then, ON May 17, after only 1 night of sleeping on the thinner mattress, I'd stopped by Quent and Dianne's to put our milk in their fridge and Dianne mentioned a friend of hers was GIVING them a new trailer mattress she had bought on Amazon, which was the wrong size for her needs, and Amazon was sending her a new one, but didn't want to bother picking up the old! She had spent $200 on it, and it was ours for free! So we were able to cram it into our van, and I brought it to Q for a birthday present.

We celebrated his birthday while we camped, and that was a hit too. Quent and Dianne brought dinner that evening. It was cold so we all sat around the table IN the camper, less Q Sr who sat on the bed, and dined on a lovely meal of rolls and salad and pulled pork and beef tenderloin, and coleslaw and potato salad. YUMMY! Then we built a fire to warm up outside and roasted s'mores for dessert while we told stories and gave gifts. The kids and I got him shorts, a shirt, and the book, "The Princess Bride." It was a very fun night.

(Left: the birthday boy with his little piro. Below: Mimi and Gaga up at Lodge Campground for the celebration of Q's birthday.)

The pianists with their fans,
Mimi and Gail.

The following morning we were back at Quent and Dianne's to shower before heading off to the girl's piano recital, which I mentioned in the post, "Oh! The Talented Children." So the closeness of the Lodge Campground to town really did hit the spot.

Later that afternoon I left Q and the kids to fish. Arthur has really been excited about fishing, and our camper backed up to 2 nice fishing holes. The kids did SEE fish, but none were caught, but not for a lack of patient sitting. Arthur CAN sit still when he wants to, apparently. We think being out in nature is EXCELLENT for him.

So while Q and the kids adventured, I was off to get Kai from SLC. He was done with his Saturday classes so he got to join us for an evening in the trailer before our trip was done. And even with his added bigness, it didn't feel too small. Because he was too long for the bunks, I thought he would share the bed with Q and I would take a bunk. But he thought that would be weird, so I happily kept my more comfortable spot and he squeezed into a bunk and used an over-sized pillow too because I'd forgotten his. THAT was a bummer. He wound up putting his shoulder out, which as of today (now in mid June) has cost us 3 different trips to the chiropractor and one trip to the PT. But Kai was a champ about it. And Arthur and Eloise were somewhat civil about having to share the table bed. (They all swapped beds each night so they could get a taste of what all the beds were like.)

And it was wonderful to be all together as a family. We finished reading "Papa Married a Mormon," and were inspired afresh with it's message of religious tolerance and love and acceptance. We were put to sleep by the rain. And we were in quite a messy state for Sunday.

 Of course, messy is relative. I was nervous that six people AND all of our stuff would mean a space of total chaos while we camped, which I knew would feel claustrophobic quick. But I snapped this pic to illustrate that it hasn't been too bad. There is plenty of storage for food and supplies for a much longer trip than this has been. And since we don't need to use the shower, our clothes have been neatly contained there in the bathroom in baskets and out of sight.

It was my plan to head again to Quent and Dianne's for showers before taking the kids to church. Q was going to stay behind and check us out of the campground. I wasn't thrilled with this plan - I wanted us to be able to help him with check-out AFTER church though it would be tight (check-out was at 2) AND I was nervous about his jeep hauling the trailer. Apparently Q didn't want to check-out alone either, and after I thought I'd confirmed the plan to go to church with ALL the kids the night before, Kai announced on Sunday that he was staying behind to help his dad.

For reasons I'll touch on later, I'd been in a fragile physical and mental state since the previous weekend. My knee, which had done a freaky locking thing when it looked like the deal to by the trailer was falling apart way back in March, had been bothering me from time to time, and now, as I cooked breakfast in the trailer, it seized again. I laid down and gave kids instructions on finishing breakfast and cleaning up and prepping the trailer to go, and decided then that none of us would go to church - I couldn't do it on a bum knee without Q, and he probably did need us to safely bring the trailer home. Q carried me to the van, Kai drove, and we trailed Q in his jeep pulling the trailer. I was stressed and worried the whole way, but we made it safely.

For me, it was a less than stellar ending to an otherwise pretty fun weekend. But I hope for the kids, it simply was the end, and a successful end, to our very first trip in the trailer. I think we successfully turned their feelings of being fed-up and finished with Airbnb stays around! If a stay means another camping adventure for us, we should be blessed to really USE this purchase, and have a lot of fun doing it!

PS: In the spirit of Walden Pond, I thought I'd keep a record of costs here. The campsite was $20/night, for a total of $60 for 3 nights. Filling the propane tank cost $18. We ran the fridge the entire time on propane, as well as cooking on the propane stove, and Q reported when he went to fill the tank again that we'd only used 1/6 of the propane! We WERE unable at this time to figure out the hot water heater, and one of the burners on the stove would light, have this tiny flame for a few minutes, then there would be a big propane explosion over the whole stove and it would go completely out. Needless to say, the trailer will be taken back to the folks who sold it to us so these problems can be addressed. The batteries were the real bummer. After pretty much only using the lights for 2 days, they were completely dead! Thankfully, we had so many trips into town, Q was able to charge them at his office on Saturday and we were fine to supplement with flash lights too. We bought a collapsible camping stool for $10, which fits nicely at the end of the table inside when we all need to eat indoors, and stores nicely out of the way when we aren't all sitting up to the table. Finally, we opted not to drain the tanks until before our next trip, but found that there was no fee for that. Thrilled the cost of camping does not eat into our Airbnb profit too much!

Oh! The Talented Children!

I realize that I'm barely into May, and that it hardly counts as summer, being in the thick of wrapping up our school lives. But in the wrapping, there are so many marvelous things to record. And having recorded about Eloise singing at the Golden Spike Celebration, I couldn't leave out the rest that happened on that Mother's Day weekend.

To me, it was fitting timing. Another mom made a comment to me about how insane it was that Mother's Day was plopped down in May when moms are the busiest with running all over the map to finish the school year and get summer ready. But enjoying the accomplishments of my children is, in my mind, the PERFECT way to spend Mother's Day. They are my life's work. And who they are and what they are becoming brings me immense joy.

It was, in fact, the day BEFORE Eloise's performance at Promontory that we got to see Kai perform in SLC. This year, he was cast as THE LEAD in Sleeping Beauty - Prince Desire - and it's a role he's been working on all year. First, it was what he and his partner, Maren Florence, competed with at YAGP. They were marvelous then (in February) and his teachers and coaches still ruffle about them being shut out in their scoring. (I think Kai and I let go of it long ago. But Kai says he isn't competing with YAGP again. And I'm fine with that. He DID have a great experience leading UP to the competition. He got great coaching from Oliver Oguma, who was an injured dancer in Ballet West. Most thrilling, Kai was also coached by his hero, Chase O'Connell, who is young, handsome, incredibly talented, and 6'4" so he reminds us all of Kai. AND Kai was coached by Adam Sklute, the current director of Ballet West. AMAZING! So he grew, his partnering and performance improved, his dancing improved, and he had a lot of fun.)

Then, in April, the Lehi location of Ballet West Academy had THEIR spring show, and a few weeks prior to their opening, he was asked to guest as prince THERE. This guesting was unpaid, but another great chance to work on the role and with a less familiar dancer is Aurora. Because my niece, Adaliah Ackerman, was performing with the school, we made a family adventure of it and all went to see. It was a blessing we did because of how crazy this later weekend in May became. Kai was good, but slightly under-rehearsed, and the stage crew blew a few moments, so the show didn't sparkle with perfection, but Kai did great. And Adaliah did too! (She had the most grace and presence on stage as anyone in her class! Fun to see the love of ballet passed along!)

Finally, on May 9, Kai opened Sleeping Beauty in SLC at the Marriott Center for Dance at the UofU. And while I was completely aware that May 9 was the date, somehow when I got online to purchase tickets, I bought the wrong night! FOUR tickets for the wrong night, because Quent and Dianne had driven down from Logan to see Kai too! The show was sold out and there were NOT seats for us. I was embarrassed slightly, but didn't feel that as keenly as much as the stress that we get IN TO SEE KAI. The Ballet West staff was fantastic about it. They are always so good to us. I don't know if that is because of how much they truly seem to love Kai, OR if it is because of my old connection (least likely), OR if they are just fabulous to everyone. But a few teachers gave up their seats to stand in the back so we could sit and watch it all. Probably in better seats than the ones I bought. And Kai was AMAZING! It was so fun to see how much growth he'd enjoyed over the last few months since competing. He was good then, but he is becoming great, and it was thrilling!

The other fun surprise was finding him on the cover of the program! That was unexpected but made this mama so proud! (I even put it in my church bag and brought it to show off at church!) Maybe the best surprise for Kai was receiving the Willam Christensen scholarship after the matinee on Saturday. I was disappointed to miss this moment but I did see it on the video. It was the last scholarship awarded, the FOUNDER scholarship, and Peter Merz said it was "awarded to a dancer the faculty also feels shows great potential and a future career path in ballet."

We loved hearing about this on the phone, because we happened to be at EV's recital that afternoon! Ballet, ballet, ballet! EV completed her level 7ab class with Becky Erickson and improved so much! She was an absolute stand-out when it came to grace. Jade Wimmer, leading dancer at CVCB and her mother, former board pres, commented on her her beautiful feet and gorgeous presence. Ned Weinshenker was able to come and I hope to be able to attach her video. We need to share the video of her voice performance with HIM. EV has experienced SO MUCH GROWTH since transferring this January to work with Debbie Ditton. We were thrilled with her improvement and impressed with ALL the singers.

In May, Eloise ALSO finally made it on to the swim team, which has been her goal for a year. And EV and Eloise both had a piano recital in which they performed with excellence.

Finally and interestingly, after Eloise had asked for months to get fake glasses, we discovered she needs REAL ones. So we got that done! She waited quite patiently for us to save over $100 by ordering glasses online. But this pic is of her actual appointment day and round of trying glasses on. And she is simply adorable! She has been very excited to wear glasses and we love her in them!

It has been a busy month, but with opportunities like these to see my kids grow, I can hardly complain. It's all been FABULOUS!

The Story of the Hideout

We finally did it! We got the trailer loaded, prepped, propane tank filled, batteries charged, hooked to Q Sr.'s truck, destination found, and with an Airbnb booking on May 16 - 19, we were off on our maiden voyage.

It has been these Airbnb bookings that have not only made possible, but made a necessity of purchasing a camper. So a bit of history on that.

When I was contemplating, years ago, a grand trip back east, I thought it made a lot of sense to do it in an RV. How else, I reasoned, would we manage getting around easily, or even survive the trip back there, or AFFORDING it at all? But it was the affording part that was tricky. I couldn't make the math work. When I factored the price for diesel gas, plus the payment on an RV, plus the depreciating value, plus the cost to camp, and then factor in we would likely NOT want to DRIVE an RV in the big eastern cities, and in fact, Q was not on board with owning an RV at all and renting didn't seem cheaper than hotel costs anyway, well, I just could never make it all come together in my mind, let alone in reality.

From that I went to campers that sit on the back of pick-up trucks. And I researched those. And I loved the idea that they would be more manageable in size, and as easy to load and unload as pulling beneath one and then pulling out. AND the kids could ride in the back while it was driven. BUT we didn't have a pick-up truck. And the challenge to buy one that could haul us across the country, AND buy a camper to fit it, seemed nearly as big of a stretch as buying an RV.

As my blog from last year tells the story, the trip back east came together for far less than either of these options would have cost. We flew out on points, we stayed in a Sabbatical home instead of an Airbnb property for a month, we rented our own home on Airbnb to raise money for it all, I directed and taught at a 2-week Intensive locally to raise money as well, so we were able to afford a few more Airbnb stays, a few different car rentals, Mom and Dad Casperson covered our housing costs in Williamsburg, and that left us with just enough money to pay for the adventures. We made the trip happen!

And the dream of an RV? It hung in there. And I thought to myself, "I DO still like the idea of driving around to see MORE of the country. BUT while I'm young, while my kids are young, perhaps we'll adventure farther out. They want to go back to Taiwan. I want to go to Europe. I can wait til I'm a grandma and get an RV then and take the grandkids."

Less than one year after returning from our adventures back east we have purchased a trailer. It seems to be a good fit for our needs. I hope it turns out to be. But here is where we landed.

Our home was rented this spring/summer/fall (at the point when we purchased the trailer) for about 50 days. That was nearly 2 months that we couldn't be HOME at all. Quent and DiAnne have always been so welcoming to have us there, but if all 6 of us stay, 2-3 are sleeping on couches (though I finally bought another foam pad for our home and put our old one at theirs). So it's crowded and the kids don't like it after one night. My parents place is far more spacious - we all get beds - but they are selling their home and understandably stressed about it. Their stress impacts our comfort, not to mention that we hope and pray for their sakes that the house won't be theirs for much longer. Other family can and does host us, but 50 days is such a long time to consistently impose on anyone.

Sometimes it just hasn't seemed logical that to make a buck, I've essentially made us homeless for two months (or more) this year! Without a big (costly) adventure on the horizon, the goal has been to use the money to pay off the house. After returning from back east, Q quit his job later last fall, reducing our income by over 20k, and reset our house payment back to a 15 year term. At that time, our payments had us scheduled to pay the house off in 12.5. But I liked that plan so much better. I LOVED the freedom (financial and other) that having a paid-off home would provide. So I decided to make up the shortfall. Our Airbnb funds could go straight to the $8k we took off our house payment with the job change. And any extra could go to savings or needed house and yard projects.

With the Airbnb money spoken for, there STILL wasn't a budget for a trailer. After all, you can't save AND make trailer payments with the same money. But at this point, I didn't know what kind of money we were talking about - I had no clue about TRAILERS. I hadn't researched these at all. I only knew that there were 2 months of homelessness on the horizon for my family and I didn't have a plan.

Which is how I came to wonder onto an RV lot one morning in February of this year. I'd just dropped the kids off in the north end of town for an ice skating lesson, and I decided, with my time, to do some in-person research. (Which I do like so much better than investigating online.) I probably hit Mountainland RV just right because instead of any of the sales people, I got the owner himself. He began most practically with what vehicles we owned that would be doing the towing. All we had was an old Jeep Grand Cherokee. And we had 6 kids, but mostly just 5 would be using the camper. So we began where we needed to, with the very small that still could sleep 6.

And I loved it! We walked into a new Hideout trailer and I was amazed at how spacious it felt. It had a slideout, which left plenty of room for someone on the floor, and there were 2 bunks and a queen bed, and the table which formed another bed. Then when I saw the price - about $16,000 out the door - I was shocked again. This seemed so DOABLE. It wasn't $20 or $30k. This was a figure that could be paid off by airbnb rentals in 2 years. But back to that sticking point: my airbnb income had already been spoken for. I then had the idea to ask what the camper could SELL for in 2 years. If it could make back the money spent on it, it wouldn't be so expensive. The owner, AC, told me it would take a good hit, dropping from $16k to around $12-10k. That didn't sound bad, a cost of $4-6k after 2 years. BUT that $10k that he told me one could be sold for - THAT was a price I really, REALLY liked. So I asked that too: what if I could FIND one for $10k, how much could IT be sold for after 2 years. And I learned this really cool info: that used trailer hung on to it's value MUCH better. Driving a new camper off the lot cost about $4k in dropping value immediately. USED campers drop at a far slower rate.

So I asked to see what they had that was used. And AC told me they didn't have and rarely saw anything like this camper used. He said they simply sold too fast. In Utah, it sleeps more people and can be used with so many more vehicles, these, he said, are simply pretty hard to find. I thanked him for his time and planned to return to share with Q what I had learned. But before I left, I told him I would discuss things with my husband who may be interested in something new, but that I could state alone I was very interested in something used and I left him with my number and asked that if he should see anything like what we saw, but that was used, to please give me a call.

Q tolerated my report on new trailers. (At least I'm pretty sure I shared it with him. I even think we shared the concept with my father-in-law because I think it was at this point that he told us they may be interested in going in on it with us.) So I filed that way too. But nothing was urgent. New campers could always be picked up, and life was busy with other things to do and summer seemed a long way off.

Then, around 2 weeks later, I got a call. It was AC. He said someone pulled into his lot and wanted to trade in their current trailer for something bigger. What they were getting rid of was just like the one I saw - only 2 years older (no slide-out) and he was selling it for $10k. Was I interested? Heck YES! DiAnne and I were at the lot within a few hours and it was perfect! I was nervous without the slide-out it would feel insanely clausterphobic, but it wasn't bad at all and I knew the price couldn't be beat. I was sold, and so was DiAnne.

But my Q needed convincing. He told me not to be overly excited and go for the first thing I saw, but to do my research. I told him I'd done mine and he needed to do his. At that point, he and I both got online and began to hunt for trailers that slept 5 (officially) that were 2 years old. We confirmed what we had been told. I couldn't find any locally under $12k. Q said he did see 2 for around $10k, but they were way back east. It would seem we could buy this trailer for LESS than we could turn around and sell it for. Q was on board.

It wasn't smooth sailing from then on out. The people at Mountainland RV did put a sold sign on it. But I wanted to work out a contract with Quent Sr. and DiAnne about it's use and terms of the resale. Q Sr. didn't want a contract, nor did he want to sell after 2 years. There wasn't much discussion about this, however. I was filtering my requests through Q, he took them to his dad, they discussed or didn't, and I wouldn't hear back. As our appointed closing date approached - the time we'd scheduled to ALL be there - I began to push harder on signing our own contract. Then, the morning before the closing, DiAnne called and asked if they could be out of the deal. Q Sr. didn't want a contract between us, and it seemed easiest to DiAnne (and to me) to have us do this alone. BUT my husband didn't agree. And it's probably for the best that the deal DID come through as a shared purchase. Though Q and DiAnne put $2k towards the closing costs, Q Sr.'s trucks have been doing the hauling, my husband has relied heavily on his dad's trailer parking expertise, and DiAnne has purchased a lot of what the trailer still needs, with a $300 cover purchase still to come. Though we may have been able to swing it without them, having their help has made things more comfortable financially, and more doable in Q's mind especially. I did not get a contract. But so far, that's been ok.

The biggest difference in our vision of trailer ownership is probably concerning when to sell. Quent and DiAnne have not used the camper yet, so this may change, but as of the moment, my plan is to sell the trailer next fall, and here is why: next fall, the trailer will only be 1 year older (it is a 2017), but we will have been able to use if for 2 seasons. We do not have a good family vehicle to tow the trailer and so we can't take it beyond where we can easily access in a borrowed vehicle. After 2 seasons, I don't imagine we'll be that excited about going to the same old spots AGAIN. And while I may be wrong on that point (maybe we'll be LOVING the same old spots) the fact remains that we DO NEED a new vehicle. If the trailer can be sold next year, we may be able to sell it for $12k. At least $10k. That will mean it has cost us very little to own AND the money from the sale can go towards a new(ish) car for us. At that point (our van already having multiple issues, to the tune of $4k this year, and 300,000 miles on it already) THAT will be the necessity.

As I type, I do have one more thought. I think the house is scheduled to be paid off in 2021. Perhaps at that time we can stop doing Airbnb unless we WANT to travel. Maybe we keep the trailer (assuming we don't need it's sale to buy a new vehicle) until we close this crazy chapter of our lives.

Who knows how things will unfold!? But for now we DO have a trailer. And it's high time I record our adventures in it!

Golden Spike 150 Year Anniversary Celebration (May 10, 2019)

This kicked off one of our first adventures this summer - the celebration of the uniting of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific Railroads at Promontory Point, Utah 150 years ago.

Eloise with choir buddy, Stella at bus drop
off at 7am that morning

We knew Eloise would be singing at it - it had been on her choir schedule since the fall. She has loved her year with Cache Children's Choir - was so delighted to sing in the Nutcracker it practically broke my heart. (I think her joy was that this was the only way she'd found to participate in this production - she'd auditioned for dancing parts but never made it. And she'd asked for dance classes SO she COULD make it. But the parts are so few, and casting is so political. I've known all along she isn't into dancing, but IS into friends and performing. And when I see her smile on stage as she sings, even sneaking little waves at us, this choir thing absolutely seems to hit the spot.)

So I was frustrated and shocked when they said she could NOT sing at this event. Apparently the invitation was for 5th graders, and I had put on Eloise's choir registration that she was in 4th. As it turned out, there were a number of things on the choir schedule like that - I signed up thinking, "Wow! This will be such a fun year with so many amazing opportunities," only to realize that they just didn't put the age specifications on the calendar and the opportunities faded away. Having Eloise NOT sing at the event would make our lives easier. Over that same weekend, Kai was set to perform with Ballet West, and EV had a dance recital too. But not performing was NOT Eloise's preference, so I went to bat for her.

When I got one of her choir directors on the phone, I pointed out that Eloise COULD be in 5th grade. Her birthday - August 31 at 11:54 pm - officially allows her to be. And she is tall enough to blend in with the older kids. Her director agreed that her behavior was not an issue either. So they told me not to tell anyone, but that they would allow her to perform! Hooray!

Eloise in her choir uniform for the broadcast.

Earlier in the spring, we'd gone to see a preview of what this performance would look like. Her choir performed with the American Festival Choir and... we didn't care for the songs related to the Golden Spike event much. In fact, we had attended this earlier event and paid for our seats with the express purpose of NOT attending the Golden Spike event - I knew the event was huge, that it would be crazy crowded, that we'd likely not even be able to see Eloise. And we'd been to the re-enactment before, which is the same every year, so we didn't NEED to go on any level. Eloise would even be bused there and back. But... BUT how could I not share this experience with her?

Thankfully, though my conscious plan all along had been to NOT attend, in the back of my mind was this quiet prompting to "prepare to go," "prepare to go." And because it simply "seemeth me good," I registered for event updates, put myself on a list to receive one of a limited number of parking passes, and kept the date and times marked on my calendar. In the end, they would up cancelling the last concert of Eloise's choir "because the kids had been so busy with these other performances," (ignoring the fact that not ALL the choir had been able to be so busy - Eloise WAS kicked out of a recording session for her age), that this was the last and culminating chance to see Eloise perform and we WENT! How could we not?

In years past, we'd invited in-laws, friends, and had a blast at the re-enactment. This year I was relieved it was just me and Arthur and EV. (We did invite Dianne, but it was so last-minute when we decided to got that she had other obligations. And as for friends, tickets did sell out, so we could only invite anyone who could fit in OUR car.) Anyway, because this was the 150 year celebration, it was MAJOR, and what should have taken just an hour to drive took 2 - for the last 8 miles we only went about 5 miles an hour! The line to get there stretched for miles. EV and Arthur were amazingly patient about it, and I tried to distract them by engaging their imaginations too. I said we might be driving about as slow as a wagon train moved - in fact I think it was still faster. And we tried to count 100 cars up ahead of us - about the number of wagons that might have been in a company - but we couldn't count that far, and in fact, the line was much, much longer than a wagon train.

Eloise was given a t-shirt, and engineers hat and scarf to wear for the even. But we went in our pioneer garb - we even took a pioneer picnic of sandwiches, apples, and strawberry rhubarb pie! The even was crowded enough we didn't feel like the rock stars we had in years past, but it was still fun to be in costume, and we did have quite a few pictures taken of our family.

When we finally arrived, perhaps some time right around when the official program began, I could see that there was no way we'd get close to being even able to make out where Eloise was, let alone watch her for all of the show. So I contented myself to be there and experience the event WITH her, and I didn't make the kids sit and watch the jumbo-trons. Instead, while the crowd was at the event and broadcast, Arthur, EV, and myself roamed about the "Hell on Wheels" tent city. We purchased some sasparilla from the saloon and EV played on their piano. We chatted with the gentleman outside the tent serving as the Masonic Lodge, and visited with other shop keepers and folks camping out in period style. We poked our heads into a few teepees. Finally, we plopped down in the middle of it all and had our lunch, part 1. Then with a slightly lighter load, and feeling the broadcast was probably wrapping up and I wanted to get a sense of where Eloise would be when it was over, we moved a bit closer - off to one side watching the jumbo-tron, to see the end of the show. It turned out I liked it much better than when we'd watched earlier in the spring. The dancing, costumes, etc. really added a lot. Musically, it was a pretty boring composition, but the staging dressed it up nicely. And the 150 children singing sounded great, Eloise included, we assumed. Here we broke out the pie, and as always, food lengthened all our attention spans.

After the broadcast ended, things were far more chaotic. I made my way to the tent where the choir was gathered and succeeded in extracting Eloise from the crowd and signing her out. But their lunches were on the bus and she wanted hers. I began slowly tromping through the crowds with her group, but then decided I would try to get back to the car to retrieve Eloise's pioneer clothes so she could change. I told her I would catch up with her. But then they were moving the trains about and the single pathway to the parking lot was closed. This cut off hundreds of departing guests from their vehicles, and cut Eloise's choir in half - she being lucky enough to be with the group that was making it's way to the buses. I thought it would be a brief delay, but they kept moving the trains and the guests trying to depart swelled and crammed. I abandoned the idea of getting back to the car, and made my way back to where I'd left EV and Arthur to update them on why Eloise was not with me, and where I'd been for the last 20 minutes. Then, because Eloise did not know where we were, I needed to go find her, and left EV again, this time taking Arthur with me. We tromped off in the general direction of where I could see the choir kids headed and buses in the distance. I did our family call/yodel from time to time, and finally found Eloise near her assigned but. BUT the lunches were not there - they had been left on another bus, and that bus was off in another area of the vast property. I told Eloise we had food - potato salad and PIE - and she was persuaded to abandon her lunch and come with us. And content to stay in her uniform because she liked the strangers telling her she'd done a great job.

So at last we were re-united. Together, we took Eloise back to all the things we'd seen, got another sasparilla from the saloon so she could enjoy it. We even got to sit on and in some covered wagons and in stage coach. In years past, the kids had been able to climb on the trains, and they were a bit disappointed that was not offered this year. But the crowds were thick and maneuvering was a trick, so mostly I was grateful we had a sense that we'd done this before and we could do it again in less crazy circumstances. We even sat for a spell and heard some bands playing after the broadcast. The weather was perfect, breezy and not too hot, and perhaps we might have hung out for hours, but we'd finally finished our food, seen all there was to see, and felt ready to go home. Thankfully the exit was far more quick and smooth than the drive in. We DID have a wonderful time, and felt so blessed to share this moment in history with our dear performer, Eloise!

We got home with just enough strength, time, and energy to shower the dirt off and head out to Black Bear Diner to celebrate the day!