Camping with the Williams

This last week we went camping with my family. It was so fun to go camping again, it has been a while since we've done it. (I guess you could count the spider-infested-city-camping we did in Texas...but I'm talking about good-ol' camping in the forest!)

We went up near Payson Lake in Utah, and it was beautiful. We were the only ones around since we went Monday-Wednesday, and it was so nice! My favorite part about camping is sitting around the camp fire every night and talking to my family. We always play psychiatrist at night (which if you have not done with my family is a must-do!) 

We also fished every night at the lake before it got dark. Clark had success and so did my brothers and my youngest sister Lauren. I didn't get pictures of this though...sad! I didn't fish because out of state fishing licenses are expensive...geesh! So I had fun sitting on the shore with Kyson feeding ducks and collecting rocks and throwing them into the water...only to collect them again.

We left early because of work, but we were so glad we got to go for a couple days. 

Our campsite was right against this mountain side, and Kyson loved climbing up this big hill with my siblings and then sliding down it. "wow...fass (fast)," he would say!

Ma and Pa getting dinner ready.

Deer!

Kyson loved being outside 24/7 and being able to get dirty. He especially loved the squirrels and baby squirrels (chipmunks) that were constantly running around our camp.

We hiked up to a pretty waterfall.

Not so sure about the water

Nice legs Ty!

Clark and Blake climbed up the side of this mountain by the waterfall.

Devils Kitchen

Devils Kitchen

Mt. Nebo...the tallest peak in the Wasach Mountains. We want to climb this someday.

Driving home...he likes having his sunglasses on if Clark or I do. He's quite the copy-cat lately!
And don't judge us for the binkie...we do what we have to do on long drives!

Ever since January I have been looking for a part-time job for when I graduated. I knew that I wanted something 1-2 days a week at the most, and I wanted benefits if I could get them.

So, I talked with St. Luke's (the big big and only health care chain in Twin) and they had me do a bunch of clinicals with them so I could get ready to start working for them. It seemed promising, and as long as you work 16 hours a week they gave full benefits. It seemed perfect.

Meanwhile I was also doing clinical hours with a guy from my ward who owns an urgent care in town. He also said they could use someone 1.5 days a week.

So I thought I had my bases covered.

As the semester went on though, I still hadn't gotten a solid offer from St. Luke's yet. I kept bugging them but they said that they had to work out the reimbursement through their Boise office, and kept saying that an offer was coming.

Meanwhile, another part-time employee at the urgent care quit his other part-time job and had asked the urgent care if he could come on full-time. They said yes. So there I went.

I did have one solid job offer from a previous clinic site I had worked at. However, for reasons I won't go into, I didn't know if it would be the best place for me.

I graduated, and started studying for my boards. I told St. Luke's and my one job offer that I needed to have a decision made by May 25th.

On May 20th I got an email from the Nurse Practitioners of Idaho group I belong to stating that Dr. Sara Johnson was also looking for a part-time NP. I emailed my resume, and had an interview on May 22nd. Dr. Sara Johnson impressed me from the first time I talked to her because her lab coat said "Sara Johnson MD and MOM." She said to me, family comes first around here, so if something comes up ever you let me know, and we work it out. What a relief to hear...someone who understands how like should be! They called me 5 minutes after the interview while I was still in the car driving home, telling me that I had the job if I wanted it. I told them that I would let them know by May 25th.

May 24th-27th Clark and I headed down to Utah for a weekend in Park City that my parents gave us for graduation. We had dropped Kyson off at my parents and headed into Salt Lake for the night. I was mad because it was May 25th and St. Luke's had still not contacted me. However, we had gone to a temple session earlier that day and felt really good about the job with Sara Johnson. So at 3:00 pm right before we went into see the Hunger Games, I called Sara Johnson and accepted. When I got out of the Hunger Games I had a message on my phone from the Medical Director at St. Luke's. I waited until we got to City Creek and found a quiet corner and called him back.

He said that he had a job offer for me...but they wanted me to work full-time for a year as a sort of "residency" and then I could drop down to part-time. What a liberating feeling it was to tell him that family comes first in my life, and that a full-time job would not allow me to put my family first. He said he respected me for the decision, and I thanked him for the call.

I have now started working 16 hours a week for Sara Johnson. So far I have loved it. (Besides the fact that I feel so dumb. I was such a smart confident nurse...and now I feel like the world's dumbest NP:) They have been so flexible with me. If I can't come in on a day, it is fine. If I need to leave early, that's fine. They know I'm having a baby and seem very willing to work with me as far as taking maternity leave, and then just working a couple hours a week while my baby is still young.

We've been able to work out a schedule so that Clark is home on the days that I work, and I am home on the other days so he can do his window washing business.

So...I feel very blessed that something so great worked out for us, and know that for now, we're doing what we are supposed to be doing!

We live on a farm...

Since my in-laws are on a mission, I'm going to try to blog a little something once a week so that they can stay updated on our lives. These first few pictures are Kyson's belated birthday gift that arrived in the mail. It has been a big hit and he has loved playing "babeball" and doing "jams."

Next off...we now live on the farm. 

It is beautiful. I love the look of a field being watered at sunrise or sunset, I don't think there is a prettier sight in the world. 

I love that I don't have neighbors and that after I put Kyson to bed I can go sit on a bucket in the garden and pull weeds and just think and no one thinks I'm weird!

I love that we spend an hour or two outside each day in the fresh air because Kyson LOVES it outside.

I love having a big garden.

I actually haven't even minded weeding the big garden yet:)

Kyson is filthy after being outside each day. I bought him rain boots so he could move pipe with Clark. He tromps around in those things, jumps and sits in puddles, then sits in the dirt. Tries to squeeze bugs with his bare hands. Steps on my carefully planted garden rows. Loves to help with the mini shovel in the garden. Continues to love the four wheelers. Loves watching the crop-dusters (airplanes) fly down so close to us. Loves all of Grandma and Grandpa's play tractors that they left in the toy room.

Things I still need to learn to love:

Housework takes three times as long when you live in a big house. I vacuumed the other day and it took 35 minutes!

Tons of laundry from all of the work clothes Clark and Kyson go through.

Spiders. Lots of them.

Driving 30 minutes to get to any type of store, gas station, etc.

Lastly, I'll record this story so I can remember it:

Kyson loves to clean with me. He usually is a great helper and especially loves cleaning the bathroom with me. He has done it probably 20 times and he knows the routine. 

Well, on Saturday I was trying to get the house clean. I was also making cookies because Clark had his ten-year high school reunion last weekend, and we were having about 6 of his best friends and their wives over that night for games and dessert. 

So, Kyson and I were cleaning the bathroom and I heard the oven timer go off. We were about to start on the bathtub, so I gave Kyson a little scrubber and told him to start cleaning the tub while I took the cookies out of the oven. Harmless right? A two-year-old with a scrubber and an empty tub. I made sure the cleaning supplies were up on the counter.

So I ran out to the kitchen, pulled the cookies out and moved them from the cookie sheet to the counter to cool. I heard Kyson coughing in the bathroom, asked if he was okay and he said "yes."

When I returned to the bathroom approximately 45 seconds later, I found Kyson in a cloud of dust diligently scrubbing the tub with comet. A LOT of comet. Somehow he had climbed up on the counter, grabbed the comet, gotten back down to the tub, and emptied the entire comet bottle into the tub. He looked so proud of himself. And how could I get mad at him?? He was doing exactly what we always do when we clean the tub, he just got amount of cleaner necessary for the job wrong.

I cleaned up what I could of the mound of comet and snapped these pictures. Then I thanked him for his help, and send him outside with two freshly baked cookies to "help" Clark for a little while so I could clean up the bathroom!!

Kuddos to him though...he actually got most of the comet in the tub, not all over the bathroom. And, as far as cleaners go, comet is pretty cheap!

So Brenda, it is possible that your tub is as clean as it's ever been right now, because I had to scrub it about ten times to get the entire bottle of comet away!!

The Airport

We met Roy and Brenda at the airport to say goodbye on May 14, 2012. It was hard watching them go through security and then get on the plane, there were some tears shed on our end for sure. Kyson didn't understand what was going on, but thought the airplane was awesome. For awhile when I asked him where Grandma and Grandpa were he kept saying that they were on an airplane. 

However, the week or so he has been saying the following....

"meema, meepa, ak-ki-ka, mmm, Jesus"

(Grandma, Grandpa, Africa, Mission, Jesus)

It's pretty cute. He sure misses his Grandma and Grandpa and asks about them every day since we are living in their house, and it must be strange to him that they haven't been around for awhile!