Just Some Normal November Stuff (Nov 2020)

 

So, in November, it finally, FINALLY, started to cool down a bit.  We played glow in the dark soccer with the Young Women and look! People were actually wearing pants and long sleeves!  Super fun activity too.  The girls really got into it.

The playoffs started for football season.  Lise and her friends had a blast at an away game.  We crushed them, of course.  And then we got another home game, so I got to watch Lise perform again.  Woot, woot!

Kylie of course has been having a blast, playing with friends, going to birthday parties and stuff.  

She also made this awesome poster on the Milky Way.  (There may have been some paint splattered all over the back patio that we had to scrub off, but that's another story.)  And finally, Kylie lost two more - and we think her last - baby teeth.  Whew! No more tooth fairy.

Kate has been her usual self, creating elaborate glow in the dark necklaces, a girl jumproping out of bead necklaces, and a "life jacket" out of Amazon bubble wrap.

Parade Practice has been in full swing, for me and Kate.

We watched the YW broadcast outside at the Bishop's house - super fun  - I even needed a jacket - except for the bugs. 

And finally, Lise invited some friends over for a potluck Friendsgiving early in November. They ended up with and interesting spread, but it seemed like they were all having a great time.

Hooray for November!  Hooray for things cooling down!  And hooray for some things being normal!!!

Eta not good for me. Iota get out of here! (Nov 2020)

So, needless to say, it's been an active hurricane season.  But it's November; can we say 'enough already'?  Apparently not.  And this time, it was Chris' turn to get hit - by a double whammy.

The first storm, Hurricane Eta, hit the coast of Nicaragua in early November as a strong Cat 4 hurricane.  Although it was only a tropical storm, dropping 4-6 inches of rain when it reached Chris, Soto Cano is in a valley, surrounded by mountains that got closer to 10 - 15" of rain.  So, you know, gravity. And all that water comes running down the mountains.  Which leads to flooding.

The sheer amoung of water ended up washing out a road on the installation and taking out a few sections of the wall perimeter.  As the installation commander, of course Chris is over all this structural stuff.  Fun! 😒

This is where the road used to be. . .

Eta was a tricky one.  It meandered around and made landfall three more times before finally crossing the Florida peninsula and heading out into the Atlantic.  At one point it looked like it could come our way and hit the Florida panhandle.  Crazy!

As the water began to recede, Chris and his guys went out to assess the damage.  Glad they could keep their sense of humor about things too . . . there was nothing but mud everywhere!

However, no sooner had they begun to start working on hurricane cleanup and repair when another hurricane developed, following almost the exact same path as Eta.  

Hurricane Iota, which was just as powerful as Eta, struck Nicaragua in nearly the exact same spot, just 13 days after Eta had hit.

Clearly, all repair work needed to be put on hold while they prepared for this next hurricane.  Luckily they had a few days notice, and since they knew exactly where the water was going to go, they were able to dredge out a massive trench where the road had once been to create a channel for the water to drain through.

Everyone worked hard and did a marvelous job.  There was still massive amounts of water, but no additional flooding or damage occurred beyond Eta's effects.  I was really proud of Chris.  I'm sure he never thought he would have to deal with being hit by two hurricanes while in command - and two weeks apart nonetheless. It was a lot of stress and not a lot of sleep, but he did a great job coordinating everyone's efforts to keep the installation up and running and minimize the damage.  No rest for the weary though - next up, fixing the base. . . (and hopefully no more hurricanes!)

Halloween and Grandpa comes to Visit - Spooky (Oct 2020)

So, in the week leading up to Halloween, my dad was finally able to come out to visit.  (He was originally going to come out during Spring Break last year . . . but we all know what happened then . . . aka the COVID shutdown.)  We were very excited for him to come, but a couple of things happened first.

1 - I voted early!  Didn't want to deal with the lines and one more thing to get off my plate.  Not a super fan of the candidates, nor all the contention in our nation at the moment, but I am a fan of the process, the basic government our founding fathers gave us to guarantee and protect our freedoms, and that we, as a nation, bear the responsibility for the direction our country takes and to make our voices heard by voting according to our good consciences.

 2 - Kylie got identified as a close contact for a positive COVID case and had to quarantine for a week.  Our first quarantine!  Kylie was very sad, as she would be in quarantine over Halloween.  Almost 1/2 of her class got quarantined with her, but her teachers were awesome about it and had a couple zoom meetings with the rest of the class to finish reading their class book.

3 - On the very day I was called to pick up Kylie from school, I was getting ready to head out the door to attend the temple - the first time in over 6 months.  My close friend's daughter was receiving her endowments before going on her mission and they invited me to attend.  I felt very privileged that they would think to invite me and also so grateful for the opportunity to once again attend the temple.  As is always the case, obstacles seem to arise when trying to attend the temple, but thankfully Kylie was old enough to be home by herself for a couple of hours before her older sisters came home from school, so I was still able to go.  It was wonderful to be in the House of the Lord, but the most pressing thing I felt while I was there was that there is power that comes from keeping your temple covenants, whether you are physically able to attend or not.  

So anywho, later that week, my dad arrived - yay!  My dad is super great at service and loves to help people.  So I had a list of projects around the house he could help me with when he arrived and it was awesome!  He cleaned out my gutters, fixed a closet door, did some trimming on my trees and bushes and helped me install a new microwave!  The last one had kind of blown out during the power surges of Hurricane Sally (although it would start working off and on randomly, which was super weird.)  So, even though it sounds kind of weird way to spend a vacation, it was just like old times going to Lowe's with my dad and helping him work on projects around the house and in the yard.  Good times.  He also did an awesome job at installing the new microwave.  I never could have done it without him.  

That week we also had a trunk-or-treat with the ward.  Since Kylie couldn't go, grandpa volunteered to stay home with her and watch a movie.  They ended up watching Maleficent. Good bonding time.  The rest of us headed to the church, Kate dressed as a greek goddess, and Lise dressed as her friend from 9th grade.  It was way simple, just outside handing out candy, but it was a lot of fun and Kate was nice enough to take around a bucket to collect candy for Kylie as well.

Kate and Kylie both ended up making a jack-o-lantern of sorts.  Kylie made hers at activity days and actually made it into the clownfish, Nemo, from the movie.  When I went to the grocery store they were all out of orange pumpkins, so white was the only option.  Kate was a sport about her albino pumpkin though and declared, "I'll just carve it as a ghost!"  It turned out pretty well.

On Halloween we went to our friends' house for a party and trick-or-treating.  Since it was Kylie's last day of quarantine and she had no symptoms, my friend was nice enough to let her come.  Totally saved Kylie's Halloween.  

Halloween was yummy food, good weather, and an amazing full moon while trick-or-treating.  And look at all that loot!

On Monday, the kids had no school and so we decided to head up to the Marianna Caverns to try and do a cave tour.  Unfortunately, when we got there, it was a two hour wait for the next tour.  We decided not to do that, but just tour the museum and take a nature walk of the park.  I kind of regret not waiting, but yeah.  We were able to get some pictures at the entrance of the cave though, and the virtual tour was interesting.  

Afterwards we headed to Olive Garden, which was scrumptious.  Kate's pointing at the sign that says "The OG Crew" because that's what my girls refer to our family as.  (OG = Original, O'Gwin, and apparently Olive Garden. 😄)  We were also able to do a little Christmas shopping afterwards with Grandpa and get some shoes for people.  

All in all it was a good trip.  Just relaxing, hanging out, but so good to get to see my dad again after 10 months!  Glad he was able to come out to visit and hopefully it won't be so long until next time.