California~ The End

On Thursday, the morning after our three day Disney adventure, some of us went to Downtown Disney to do a little shopping. After we found our souvenirs, the Master and I sat outside in the shade drinking frozen pink lemonades and soaking it all in. We knew that cold weather and rain waited for us back home. You know me, I love a palm tree, so I was just dreaming of living in a sunnier place!

Our "selfie". Not bad for a couple of Baby Boomers!

Nick & Di hamming it up.

The next day was Nick's big day.

After two years of late night study groups, paper writing,

Internships, and plain old work he was receiving his Master's of Social Work 

from

 the University of Southern California.

Diana  made a little cap and gown for Lucas, no pattern!

Nick wanted Lucas to walk with him to get his diploma. We were all worried he might not be a happy camper but he loved every second of it! I swiped a few photos from Diana here.

 Look really close and you can see Nick and Lucas about to get the diploma!

Louie was a big hit! He had everyone smiling. Notice the security guy taking a picture of him!

I absolutely adore this picture! Nick and Diana had been posing for us and Lucas wanted to be a part of it. This photo and the next one speak true joy to me! They did this together with lots of sacrifice and patience

It's always interesting to be in the LA area. You never know who you are going to see. We were standing there and Kareem Abdul Jabar walked by with his SoCal casual Hawaiian shirt, khaki shorts, and straw Panama hat on. My camera was not at the ready for that!

Then we had a fun photo bomber drop by. Nobody famous,

 he just popped into the picture we were taking and congratulated Nick!

Here are the members of the Mowes family who made the trip.

From left are Jessica, Nick's sis-in-law (husband Cameron is in Afghanistan right now), brother Brandon who just graduated from the Navy's nuclear school on the east coast, father Michael, Nick, Lucas being silly, Diana, and mother Tami. Mike and Tami are back in the States after being stationed in Germany. They live in South Carolina now with sister Hanna who was not able to come because of school.

I would like to mention that Jessica is living her dream while her husband is deployed. She is a member of the San Diego City Ballet! Love her darling personality!

Here we are...the Loose gang! Britt, Rachel, Sarah, Dee, Nick, Lucas, Diana, Richard, & Moi. It was Los Angeles and we were the best dressed people there! I told my men they had better wear a tie, it's a graduation for Pete's sake! Richard quickly discarded his! Dee would like me to point out that he forgot his dress shoes at home, and I had a blister the size of a quarter on my right foot so I wore my flip flops, feeling badly about it until we got there and saw how casual the atmosphere was!

 Also present were Nick's grandparents, Gunther and Hannalore. They are so cute!

Apparently it is tradition to have your photo taken by the Tommy the Trojan statue. The line up front was quite long so we sneaked in for a back view!

The next day we headed south to beautiful Laguna Beach for an afternoon of sun and relaxing.

It was so fun to be all together!

I love my kids and it seems they are all heading in different directions geographically, so I cherished this time.

 Louie is such a little water bug! He was totally in his element having been a beach baby his whole long life!

Roxie, on the other hand, was a bit more tentative and did not appreciate the ocean. 

 We had a wonderful trip! 

The best was seeing Nick get that degree and being all together! 

Isn't family just the best blessing there is? 

Celebration!

Our trip to sunny California was wonderful! I'll tell you all about it, but first I must share some wonderful news!
As many of you know, our son Richard has faced some tremendous challenges in his young life. He was diagnosed in 7th grade with anxiety disorder and O.C.D. Real, full blown OCD, not the kind everyone jokes about like, "Oh, that must be my OCD making me do that...". O.C.D. is no laughing matter. We sunk in to the depths of it all through Jr. High and into High School. He was teased and bullied unmercifully by kids who were from good families and knew better. Why do children do that to each other? Why do they pick on the perceived "weak one" like chicken pecking the sick hen to death. My sweet boy got to a point where he wondered why any of it was worth it. It frightened me terribly. After much prayer and some good therapy, as well as his maturing and understanding better what was happening inside of himself, he has done very well at mastering the awful impulses that haunt him.

School was a nightmare. He had such a hard time focusing and learned to avoid assignments and studying to avoid the stress. (We are still working on that one!) He is a very intelligent guy, brilliant in sciences and things like that. He can tell you pretty much all about the solar system and how things happen out there. He knows a lot! Making it come out in written word and on tests is another matter. We were getting nowhere at American Fork High School with the counseling department there. He was being lost in the system. We took him out and enrolled him at Lone Peak High where my husband's friends and colleagues promised to, "not let him fail." Through much patience and diligence on their parts, and through some credit recovery on Electronic High School he has completed the requirements for his high school diploma! I wondered for awhile if it would happen. The same issues with getting assignments done in school were also issues online. It didn't help that the E-high school teachers were on strike for 6 months either.

The day after we returned from vacation Richard got a call early in the morning from Debbie Wahlin, his resource counselor, telling him to come on over and pick up his diploma! When Richard told me I threw an armful of laundry into the air and threw my arms around him! We hugged and hugged and I cried a bit. It has been a long, hard journey. I am proud of my son. He is a good man and has a lifetime ahead of him to bless
others with his wonderful kindness and love!

Here is Richard and his Dad with Debbie Wahlin.

She was so instrumental in this day and we owe her so much! She is what the education process is all about, patient as the day is long, and so encouraging and positive with our son.

 This is Jolynn Wright, one of Richard's teachers. She is an amazing teacher who took time with him and helped him make friends at a new school. When we entered her room last Monday to thank her, it was the end of a long day. She was very emotional already and started to cry as Richard showed her his diploma. She said she had just had an experience with a girl that had reminded her why she had become a teacher in the first place. I hope she knows how much we owe her for her hard work and dedication to her students!

Ta Da!!!

 Richard, we are so proud of you!

Toronto: Part One

I have returned from my Big Adventure! It all began on Wednesday, Nov. 13th. I flew from Salt Lake City to Chicago, Illinois then changed planes and continued on to Buffalo, New York where Sarah met me. We jumped into her rental car and drove straight to Niagara Falls. It was late afternoon and I was afraid I wouldn't get to see the falls. Silly me! They have HUGE spotlights on them at night.

Sarah took me on a walking tour of the city of Toronto on Thursday. I will blog about this next time. Right now I am anxious to show you the main event! On Friday, after 6 years of unrelenting toil (to quote Wilbur the Pig about Charlotte the spider) Sarah received  A Doctor of Philosophy degree in history. Medieval/Renaissance to be exact. The building in the background is called University College. It is where we picked up her robes. There is a cool ghost story about it and why there is only one turret tower on the top. I'll tell you sometime! Bottom Left: Afterward I met Sarah's advisor Nicholas Terpstra. He has been such a help and support for her all of this time.  Bottom Center: Sarah's dear roommate Seija Kromm (it's Finnish pronounced Say-ah) was with me through the ceremony and I got this cute shot of them afterward. They teach Seminary together for the Stake. Bottom & Top Right: Sarah in the walkway outside of University College  where she dropped off her robes. She would have you know that the top right picture is not a serious one. We asked her to look scholarly, then we all laughed! It was a beautiful day and I was so honored to be there to see Sarah's long, hard work come to it's completion. I cannot tell you how proud I am of her perseverance and dedication to getting this done. She was offered a short-term job teaching a course at the Scarborough Campus of U of Toronto so that will keep her busy and give her grocery and rent money until another job comes along. She has applied everywhere and we will keep praying that she finds one. I will blog again soon and share some more of my Big Adventure in Canada and New York!

Moving On

This is a strange season for me. My youngest child, my only son is finishing his public school days. This journey began for me in August of 1985 when our oldest, Sarah skipped off to her first day of kindergarten. If I did my math correctly that is 23 years of having children in public school. That's a long time folks! It's a lot of lunch boxes, brown bags, spiral notebooks, new pencils, backpacks, etc...! I feel the passage time in my body. I no longer spring out of bed, ready to do an assembly line of ponytails and ribbons, getting myself and three little girls ready for a day at school. Richard wakes up at least an hour before me. He makes his own lunches and patiently waits for his old mother to hobble down the stairs, bleary-eyed and groggy.
I love him! He is so much like his father in the way he treats me. He is kind and patient. He compliments me and always asks how I am feeling.

I looked all through my external hard drive for these photos and couldn't find them. I got out the old scrap books and took pictures of pictures, which is why they are blurry!

 

Here is Richard with his Mom (me!) the day he first met his teacher for Kindergarten
He was so proud of his Star Wars backpack and loved the huge Darth Maul band Aide on his scraped-up knee!

This is Richard after he came homeon his first day of Kindergarten in August of 2000.

If I could go back 13 years and whisper in my own ear I would tell myself to be the same kind of mother I had always been but to be brave. The ride was going to be rough and painful. While Richard has brought great joy to our lives, he has faced challenges that have given all of us sorrow too. I don't really want to focus on that but just recognize that it is a reality. He has struggled mightily, more than anyone but his Dad and I will ever know. We work with him daily, trying not to cross the line of taking over and doing it all for him. We pray for him daily, that the discouragements of the past will be replaced by a desire to achieve and continue on in his learning. He has two classes to finish through Electronic High School before he will receive his diploma. He is still working to complete some assignments at Lone Peak in order to receive credit. There will be no cap and gown, but there will be a great sigh of relief and a sense of accomplishment on all of our parts.

A few weeks ago, in meeting with one of Richard's counselors Dee was told, "just do it for him. He is so intelligent, he knows his stuff and he will be fine".  Dee offered to help Richard complete some pointless, tedious assignments that he had been putting off. Richard would have no part of that. "That would be lying Dad. I need to do it myself." Did I mention that I LOVE him?

So, while hundreds of young people are marching into the Marriot Center on Thursday in full ceremony, my son and I are going out for ice cream. We will come home and get back to work on the EHS classes. He will finish. He will go on and be a wonderful, good man.

Last Sunday Richard received his Seminary Recognition certificate for completing four years of LDS Seminary. I cried through the whole evening. Where has the time gone? I am so proud of my son and his love of the Gospel of Christ and his love of the Church. This certificate is very important to me. I wanted to take a picture of him as he shook the Stake President's hand. It was the nearest thing I'd get to a graduation photo but can you do that in the chapel? I resisted. This is what we got instead...

I love you Buddy!