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I could also title this post "Taking a Deep Breath".  It doesn't matter. For those of us who are stay-at-home moms, our work is never done.  When my husband suggests that we stay home on vacation, I chuckle.  Staying at home for me is never a vacation.  My job continues.  Cleaning, cooking, managing activities, taking care of the animals.  The only way I can have a vacation is to get away, and in John's defense, he is very, very good at allowing me that luxury. Interlochen is the balm of Gilead in my life. It is a time where I get away from the monotony of life at home.  We can eat at the cafeteria for every meal.  Ahhhh, not needing to figure out what we are eating each night?  Such a lovely thing.  I also don't have to clean.  There are hired cleaning people for our cabin/dorm rooms.  They even clean the bathrooms!  Too, both John and I receive a bit of a respite from our church responsibilities.  While we are still asked to speak at our 15-person branch he

Let me pull out my box of Kleenex before I begin... Ethan has now been home from his mission for two weeks.  While other missionaries return to lives of normalcy, Ethan has not been afforded that luxury.  At least, not in the "normal" sense. Our Kennedy family runs non-stop.  We never seem to stop, or take a break.  I'm sure Ethan hoped that he would be sitting around, catching up on two years of missed movies, and reading from the piles of books I left by his bedside.  No.  No way, Jose.  As much as I would like for him to have the opportunity to relax after his mission, he hasn't been given that chance, and I feel badly for him. Within the first weekend of being home, he had spent more hours driving in a car than he had spent in a car on his mission.  Driving, driving and more driving.  I never once heard him complain, but instead he would crack a joke about it.  It did give him time with Mark which was a very good thing, but I'm sure he didn't envision hour

Nothing means more to a missionary than letters from home!  Here's Mark's information for the next few months.  Lucky Mark--he gets to be in the MTC the longest of any group due to the difficulty of the Russian language!  We were told that he will actually head out to Russia mid-October, but we'll see. In the meantime, here's his address at the MTC: Elder Mark Sterling Kennedy MTC Mailbox #140 RUS-SPET 1002 2005 N 900 E Provo, UT  84604-1793 And his email address (for the duration of his mission):  mark.kennedy@myldsmail.net Thanks again to all of you who supported Ethan on his mission.  I can't tell you how much that means to me as a mother.

Mark entered the Missionary Training Center today. Deep breath... I can't believe it's starting all over again.  Just six days after Ethan comes home, Mark is gone. I know, I know.  It should be a happy thing.  I should rejoice in the fact that my son is worthy to serve a mission, and that he will have such marvelous opportunities over the next two years. I can say (and write) those words, but I sure don't feel them. I can count my closest friends on two hands and those friends include my husband and kids.  Losing contact with Mark is just painful. I would like to say "here is a list of things that I'm most looking forward to hearing/seeing again when Mark comes home", but in my mind I think "here are the things I will miss the most, and how am I going to get by without them": 1.  Mark's chipmunk voice.  It doesn't matter where he is, he always answers the phone in his chipmunk voice.  I think he learned through the years that if

There are a lot of things that Mark will miss while on his mission, but his girlfriend, Becca, is going to be at the top of the list.  They have grown very close over the past few months, and it's going to be a hard "goodbye" tomorrow.  Mark asked me to take some pictures of the two of them, and I was more than happy to oblige.

With Ethan's homecoming and Mark's farewell this Sunday, we only had one complete day together as a family.  It was a rather sad thing, but we took advantage of it as best we could. Ethan didn't have his luggage, so Mark helped him get some "swag" on! Watching "Tangled" together.  We thought we would ease Ethan back into movies. Playing miniature golf at Pirate's Cove.  Yes, the boys played all 18 holes with clubs that size! It's an amazing place! Family pictures.  I was not letting two years go by without a family picture!  Thankfully, Ethan had brought home Poland soccer jerseys for all of us!  Perfect!  I took a lot of pictures, but I must save the best for the Christmas card this year.  Here are some of them:

The day after Ethan got "home" (or, back to Interlochen with us), he was helping his brother prepare for his mission.  I found them together in their dorm room, studying one of the lessons from Preach My Gospel.  Mark was mentally exhausted afterwards, but I know he will be grateful for the help and guidance his brother is giving him now when he enters the MTC. When I looked closer, I saw dear friends of Ethan's: Yes, he was given these scriptures when he got baptized at age 8.  He asked me if he could get new scriptures before his mission, and I told him "no".  I'm glad I did.  Those scriptures have been with him forever, and I'm glad to know they were always with him on his mission.

We all agreed:  it seemed surreal to think about Ethan actually being home again.  To walk into a restaurant and ask for a table for "6" instead of the 5 people we have been for the past two years.  To see Ethan sitting on the couch, checking his favorite news websites.  To realize that we don't own a vehicle that actually seats all of us. For me, it didn't hit until the day he was coming home.  Wednesday, July 11.  I was actually driving back to Michigan from Pennsylvania, and I thought of seeing his face again.  I was overcome with emotion. Traveling from Poland, he had three different flights.  One from Warsaw to London, London to Chicago, and Chicago to Traverse City.  He was scheduled to arrive in Traverse City at 9:55 p.m.  We could hardly wait! When we got to the airport, we realized that nobody had thought to bring balloons, or signs, or anything.  So, John came up with a cheer, and we were so desperate, and crazed with excitement, we actually went along

Mark is 6'5" tall.  He's 19 years old (a legal adult).  He has now been away from home for a year.  He can obviously handle the rigors of earning dual degrees and rowing for the Michigan Men's Rowing Team while being a commuter student.  He was active in church and had lots of friends.  He can take care of himself. And yet, whenever any women get around Mark, they want to do one thing:  mother him. I don't usually think of the word "mother" as a verb, but in the case of Mark, it couldn't be anything else. I am the most guilty of the action.  As soon as he comes home, I just want him to catch up on his sleep, so I do everything for him.  I make his food for him, I do his laundry, I even occasionally pick up his dirty clothes.  Pathetic, I know.  Or at least I thought it was until I noticed that I'm not alone. Mark likes to joke about how tired he gets of living with his three mothers.  Of course, he says it in some snarky way like, "Oh

Heavenly Father never gives us a moment's rest, does he?  At least, he doesn't let us wicked people rest :-) I have gone through some pretty difficult times in my life, mostly as a child.  I experienced things that when shared with friends, first bring astonishment to their faces and then tears.  I am thankful for my family, and my close friends who can help me feel some sense of accomplishment in the fact that I have overcome the pain and suffering and created a better life for myself.  One of the saddest things for me is to see people who experienced similar horrors and have become victims to those experiences, leading troubled and fearful lives and often continuing the cycle. One thing that got me through the very solitary, very scary times as a child was my faith.  I don't say this to brag.  I can't deny that it was a gift from a very loving Heavenly Father who knew what I would face and who knew what I would need to survive.  There were times when all I could d

When our family lived in Germany, John and I discovered that a live performance of any Shakespeare play was only a short plane ride across the English Channel.  The Royal Shakespeare Company performed in several different venues in Stratford-Upon-Avon. Originally, I wanted to see one just so that I could say that I did it.  However, I quickly discovered that the experience was much more than just a "must-do".  John and I saw Hamlet for the first time.  I anticipated seeing the actors dressed in 16th century garb, but the RNC had decided to take a different approach.  They performed the entire play in Godfather/Mafia style.  It was an unforgettable performance (obviously, since I can still remember it, and it's been over 10 years).  To prepare for the performance (because I figured I wouldn't have any idea what was going on, John and I read the play together on the plane ride over.  I was amazed at how quickly we flew through the reading, and I understood it all.  Wh

So thank goodness for Mommy cause she reminded me that a long time ago (less than a month) I said I would post stuff on the blog to remember stuff about rowing. So here I am starting these posts(: One of my most ridiculous memories of rowing would have to be four weeks before Nationals (ACRA) and two weeks Dad Vails in Philly, I was assigned to be in the Lightweight 8 boat. Now in rowing there are two types of rowers: lightweights and heavyweights. Heavyweights can basically be anybody, big or small. (It should actually be called any-weights cause even lightweight rowers can row in heavyweight races.) Lightweights though have a strict weight requirement: the day before racing starts, all lightweight rowers have to weigh-in at under 160 lbs on an official scale. If one person in the boat doesnt weigh under, the whole boat doesn't race, so a lot is riding on the weigh-in. Now to put this all in perspective, of the 8 guys in the boat, 7 are all under 5'10". Me? 6'5&

Interlochen is a performance venue for all kinds of artists.  Kresge Auditorium is the main theatre, outdoor and covered and seating 5,000 people.  Each summer, Interlochen hosts a summer series of artists who perform in Kresge.  We've never been ones to buy tickets.  Until this year. Two performances caught my eye immediately:  Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers, and Gavin DeGraw with Andy Grammer.  I got online and bought the tickets. Steve Martin's show was sold out within two days.  I was glad to get the three tickets that I did, but you better believe we weren't sitting next to each other.  Steve Martin began playing the banjo when he was 17, and he is now considered one of the best banjo players in the US, winning a grammy for a CD released in 2010.  Who knew???  The Steep Canyon Rangers are his "back-up" band, although they are a performing group in their own right, only joining with Steve Martin on occasion.  The evening was filled with bluegra