Three Years

Last week marked THREE YEARS since moving to Logan.

It’s the strangest thing. Three years is practically nothing. A year goes by in a blink. Three blinks aren’t much longer. Surely not long enough for much to have happened or much to have changed.

And yet! …

So much has shifted. So much has been added to our lives' experiences. Such an enormous mass of tangled together things (woven together—that sounds nicer) that I can hardly think where to even begin teasing it all apart.

When we came here, a full half of our children were elementary-aged or younger. (Anders through Hans in elementary school. Starling still spending full days at home with me.) Now we’ve got Anders heading into high school and Summer and Mette to middle school. Goldie was only just leaving on her mission. Not only has she returned but she’s married. Abe is married. A grandson is coming. We’ve had two college graduations, a master’s program graduation, and a high school graduation during our time here. Jesse, who was barely entering high school as a little 9th grader when we arrived, has already taken the ACT and registered for his senior year. (And we are already talking about the mission he will likely be leaving for by this time next year.) We’ve watched the whole face of the land here at the farm shift as a road has been widened, a ditch has been redone, fences have been moved, a drive has been put in and an entire house has been erected on a spot of the farm that, for years, I rarely even stepped foot on (as it was fenced off cow pasture).

And within those major events and stage shifts have been … well, you know, all the details of actually living them. (For example when I say: “fences moved” or a “house erected”, I actually recall the barbed wire hooks that would not unbend, and the heat, and the sound of the post-hole pounder; sitting at a fruitless and frustrating meeting with someone at the county, kids running excitedly up a new wooden staircase to a second floor with no walls to obstruct their view, the plumber flooding the new apartment, choosing green paint with Mike, wandering Home Depot late at night for bathroom mirrors, and a thousand etceteras. The same is true for all of the milestones listed above.)

And, of course, we’ve lived a thousand other things alongside these big changes to our family: three Christmases at the rental, goat shows, figuring new schools and bus routes, youth activities, running girls’ camps, surgeries (tonsils and knee), and getting to know maybe hundreds of new people. (Hundreds? Is that pushing it? I’m not sure it is. Two entire wards. And schoolteachers. And seven kids’ friends. Etc. Certainly there are at least DOZENS of people we genuinely care about and stop and chat and catch up with whenever we bump into one another. People we didn't even know existed before coming here. To me that’s one of the most miraculous things about these three years. All of the people. And the wild realization that, somehow, there is always room to love more people. And then more again!)

During my years up here, I've been occasionally borrowing my mom's and dad's old journals. There they are in them--the center of their large and bustling (and shifting) family. Planning weddings, navigating stressful callings, attending kids' sporting events, sending out missionaries, bringing a sick child home from church, not getting enough sleep, cooking the Thanksgiving turkey, trying to get last presents purchased and wrapped as Christmas approaches, trying to figure how to afford another car repair, cutting back the raspberries, harvesting the banana squash, attending parent-teacher conferences. This entire world just circling around them and being created by them. 

And now here I am. The details might be slightly different. (It's the farm instead of Polk's End, presents are being ordered online instead of picked up at "Grand Central", etc.) But so much of it is familiar. I was there--swirled into it all as they lived it, and now I'm now here--living the version of it that Mike and I have created. It fills me with this constant ... oh there's no right word. Nostagia? Melancholy? Not exactly. Just this wistful feeling--aching over the beauty and wonder of that whole world they created that has somewhat passed and over the one I'm living that is hurtling by. Somehow the idea of any good thing becoming part of a lived-out past seems to cause an ache in the depths of my soul. I know it shouldn't. It is all a part of the good that continues to be woven into the future. Still, I hope it only chaffes my spirit so sorely because ... somehow, some eternal part of me knows that none of it is actually gone. It's just ... I don't know how that can be with my current mortal understanding. 

But, enough of all this thoughtful rambling. A few pictures from life around here a full three years into living in Cache Valley.

Morning scriptures. (It's rare for Penny to be here in the morning. She has been working over full time much of this summer and is usually at Target by 6:30 am. Jesse has also been gone most of this summer working on irrigation up at Utah State. Anders was here--just not snuggled in with everyone.)

That's Mike back there--planting the spruce that we bought and used for our last Christmas at the rental. It isn't doing great. Fingers crossed it makes it!

Costco. We got Goldie and Wyatt a membership there for Goldie's birthday and then waited for her to do some shopping. 

(I love our Costco because it is so much less crowded than our old Ogden one was.)

Probably trying to type a blog post. (As I typed this very one I had to explain to one kid that I grumped at that, while they had only come to ask for something three times, there were six other kids who had done the same thing, which lead to 21 pauses to take care of something as I tried to write one post.)

Just know that it is miraculous any time you see Starling wearing anything other than a white nightgown.

Anders was greeted home from Young Men's camp as if he'd been gone for years. (I'm sure Jesse and Summer had similar greetings after their camps. I just didn't have my phone out.)

Jesse got his braces off. Just in time for his senior year.

Mette with her two best friends Rachel and Annabelle. It's a hard thing for my kids that the majority of their elementary friends go to a different middle school. Mette won't have either of these two with her next year. 

Starling out doing some thoughtful writing.

Abe and Kenya up for a visit before heading to Canada and Glacier National Park, etc. 

And last, but certainly not least, our Summer girl turned 12! We are watching, real time, this tiny person morph from a child to a young lady. Last summer she was still buying Calico Critters. This summer she's often in her room listening to music. I really did think these last four would be little kids ... forever.

And, if you were curious who that unfamiliar little curly-haired boy was in some of her birthday pictures, Devin and Melissa came up for the day with their kids Stella, Moses and baby Bjorn (who we were seeing for the first time):

The End.