Confession...

At first I though we'd been squeezed into an over-scheduled, over-extended lifestyle by the demands of life in the 21st century, and it may have started that way. Now I am realizing that we are right there in the midst of frenzy because we have lost the fine art of rest.

We've been trying to spend the evenings watching "Psych" episodes (Kelsey got them as a graduation present), and I've discovered I cannot  just sit and watch a DVD anymore. It makes me positively twitchy.  I am surfing or planning or chatting or crafting at the same time. I don't even know how to sit and watch TV/DVDs/Netflix without doing something else at the same time.

I think I need to look into Multitaskers Anonymous. 

When your pool water is old...

Remember when our pool started acting up?  You can refresh your memory here. In spite of the regimen of algaecide, citric acid, and flocculant, this spring we had the worst battle with stains and algae we've ever had.

It was so bad, we abandoned googling answers and went straight to asking the neighbor who owns a pool company for help. What we discovered was this: our water is old. Seriously. The same water has been in the pool for, well, every since we moved here in 2007,  and who knows how long before that.

Did you know that chlorine is a gas and to put it into pool water, chlorine tablets contain cyanuric acid as a stabilizer for the chlorine? It keeps it from breaking down under the ultraviolet rays of the sun. When the concentration of cyanuric acid grows to high levels over the years, it prevents chlorine from breaking down altogether. Since the chlorine can't release, it doesn't kill algae. So you add algaecide, which raises the copper level in the water. If your water is already prone to high levels of copper (and this happens especially if you have a pool heater), the copper in the water clings to the pool liner and creates large brownish gold stains.

Now, if this happens several years in a row, other chemicals start to break down. The cyanuric acid breaks down and somehow (magic is my theory) you get a lovely coating of purple sediment all over the flat surfaces of your pool liner.

The water can be perfectly clear, but there are brown stains and purple sand all over the place. The scientific name for this is ick. When you step out of the pool, it looks like the picture below:

Ew

So, you call your neighbor the pool company owner who explains your water is old. You drain about half the water out, refill it with fresh water, and turn over the keys to the gate to the pool guys who will tweak it until it's perfect.

And that's how you deal with old water in the pool. Next March, I will be posting about how you deal with putting in a new pool liner.

So tired...

Do you ever get tired? So tired that you just sit and stare and think about the endless list of things you should get up and do, but you can't manage to actually move. So tired that you imagine you unload the dishwasher and put away the clean clothes, but there they still sit, loaded full and stacked high?

That's how I feel.

It was a long year. Long. I think back to September when my mom fell and November when my dad died. Forever ago. Mom is recovering well. Not without a few bumps in the road, but still recovering nonetheless.

Sometimes I forget Dad is gone, and then something happens that I would tell him about and I think about calling him and imagine how I'd start the conversation. And I remember. It was hard not having him at Kelsey's graduation. She is such a hard-worker. He would have been proud.

It seems forever ago, almost like it didn't even happen in this decade or even this millennium. It's weird.

Since all that happened, there have been countless hours of school and homework and grading and late-night chats and tears and laughter and cleaning and crafting and loading and unloading and folding and putting away.

School ended last Friday, and we rolled straight into graduation and graduation parties. Rolling, rolling, rolling.

Monday morning dawned. I suppose. I slept through dawn, thankfully. On Tuesday, Zane finished up his exams. Summer has officially begun, and we look like the wounded warriors' wing of some scholastic infirmary.

Rest. We need rest, and not just sleep--rest.

I need to watch this again. I'm going to tuck it here to remind myself to rest.

Gradualation...

Because gradually, she is moving into her own life. It's a good thing. It's not an easy thing, but it is good because that's the way God made this world. We are born, we grow, we learn, we leave,  we join lives, we make a life, we give life, we raise lives, we love, we move, we change, we live. Life.

Only dead things don't move, so all things considered, I am excited to see our lives enter this new stage. Truly.

Kelsey graduated on June 1, 2012. It was wonderful. She was beautiful.

The march into the gym. She's the front white gown in this shot,
 just rounding the corner.

Presentation of a very hard-earned diploma.

The family.

The sweet, sweet friends.

My really cool pink flamingo dress.
Who on earth wears a pink flamingo dress to graduation?!

I am proud of my girl. She worked so very hard, and the road was NOT an easy one.

I am grateful that the Lord allowed her to achieve all that she did. She is His, and she shines for Him. She also received many accolades, for which she gives Him the glory. We do too. In case you missed graduation (and since our little nuclear family and our friends Shannon and Jocelyn were the only folks sitting on our family row), here is a list of the recognitions Kelsey received:

--Senior Superlative: Best Leader
--Class Officer: Senior Representative
--Gold Honor Cord (4.0+ GPA)
--National Honor Society
--Presidential Outstanding Academic Excellence (3.5+ unweighted GPA, 85th+ percentile on ACT or SAT)
--ACSI Distinguished High School Students (areas of Academics and Christian Service)
--Medallion Award (voted by faculty): Leadership
--Silver Honor Cord - 100+ community service hours
--Rainbow Honor Cord - Art National Honor Society

While this is a pretty cool list of earthly achievements and all of us are grateful to have some tangible representations of the fruit of all that labor, nothing compares to the work done on our behalf by Jesus. Nothing. Salvation is THE greatest reward we ever receive, and we do absolutely nothing to merit it. It's all Him. It's all grace.

We give thanks and praise to the Lord for the work He is completing in in her.  He simply blows us away.