Well, Gabe has officially been in the MTC for 2.5 weeks, and we are still trying to adjust to life without him around. I feel like I'm having the hardest time. Caleb and Avery seem fine, Josh seems okay. I'm struggling. Gabe and I were really best buds, so it's hard for me not having him around. I keep having thoughts about having another baby and I'm not sure if that's just my mid-life crisis and being sad over Gabe leaving, or if it's actually something I'm feeling prompted about. It sounds crazy. It is crazy. I always told people having a surprise baby after my kids were old would be my nightmare. Now I'm actually considering it! I should probably stop. Who knows if we even COULD have another baby. So, I better just stop thinking about it.
Anyways, the house does still seem quieter and emptier without Gabe. But Caleb is like a 10-year-old boy at heart, even though he's 16 and 280 pounds. Last night, he had his friends Benson, Cole, and Jameson over and they had each proudly bought their own big Lego set at Walmart. Then they came back here and started to assemble them in our living room while watching a movie.
I feel like having teenagers brings so much life into the home because it's their friends that are over too. I miss having Gabe Appleby and Noah and Porter over, who were Gabe's good friends. Porter is on a mission too and Noah and Gabe A. both are starting their senior year this year. Avery's in that awkward preteen spot where she just struggles with friends. I feel like she doesn't really have people over like the boys always did. Boys really are so much easier to raise than girls, at least our boys. I hope Avery gets a little nicer and happier in her teen years.
Also on Saturday, we floated the Warm Slough, just me, Josh, Avery, and Caleb. We had tried to invite the Milners or the Hughes, but they were both busy. I feel like it's kind of a bummer that a lot of my friends are younger than me, or even if they AREN'T younger, they feel younger because they started having kids later. Like all of my high school friends right now have kids that are 5-10 years old because they didn't start having kids until their late 20s or 30s, whereas I had Gabe at 21. I always thought I'd be so happy and feeling like ahead of the game to be done raising kids at like 45, but now thinking about being an empty nester at 46 makes me really, really sad. Like, crying hysterically in the shower and wondering what my purpose in life is sad (which is what I did a few hours ago in the shower.) But I probably need to just embrace that I'm getting old I guess. In the evening, we went out to dinner with Lindsey and Cody Summers. Colter and Clay came over here and hung out with Caleb and Avery and went swimming, but Landyn was with friends at the fair and Cayson was with friends somewhere. I really like Cody and Lindsey. I honestly think if they didn't have two little boys, maybe I wouldn't be wanting to have another baby. But I look around at all my friends and think, "What am I going to be doing once Caleb leaves? Our house will be sooo boring, and Josh will be working for 10 more years and all my friends will be busy with their kids, and I'll just be sitting around looking at a wall and feeling sad!" It's really been occupying my thoughts lately that I should've had another kid or two after Avery.
I feel like I haven't really talked about anything we did this week! We also helped Claire moved, which also sucks, because she was my good friend and now she doesn't live in our neighborhood anymore. She moved into an older part of town and honestly, I think the house they bought is pretty crappy, but she so desperately wanted to buy a house. Now I can't ride my bike over there anymore, which is also adding to why I'm feeling bored and sad.
Caleb has been having football practices lately. I am really excited to watch him play football this fall. Hopefully, that goes well and he feels like he's a good part of the team. There's been a little drama lately over which position he will play. We were thinking he would be center, but now there's been talk about him playing guard or something. I would rather him play center. He's good at snapping the ball. But we will see!
Josh is super busy with his chief duties all the time. I feel like whenever he's not at work he's either talking on the phone or texting someone. We had a boy in our community named Eliah Gordo commit suicide the other day, which was awful, and Josh was the first one on the scene. Caleb knew him pretty well and was on student council with him. They are having a candlelight vigil tonight for him at the baseball fields. I think about what I'm going through missing Gabe, and then I get kind of like, sheepish because I think of Brandee (Eliah's mom) and the hell she must be going through right now. I can't even imagine.
Anyways, I start teacher work days and inservices on Tuesday - Friday, so I better get my head in the game for school. Then the kids all start back on Monday, August 26. I'm hoping teaching gets my mind off things, but right now I just feel so weird. It just doesn't feel quite right and I'm worried that it never will again. :( Does this ever get better? Here are some pictures of Gabe (tons more are on his blog page) but he's doing well, and I'm grateful for that!
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