January – Terry Family Shenanigans

Paperwork…and a Call

Matthew decided that he is going to go on a mission as soon as he graduates from high school. He started filling out the paperwork for it and submitted it this week. He has an interview next week and then within a week or two after that he should find out where he is going! We did a couple practice photos to submit with his paperwork. A lot of his friends have gotten there calls or have already left. They are going to Brazil, Sweden, Singapore, Philippines, Panama, Utah and Italy. He is really hoping to get somewhere out of the United States. He is worried that having asthma will make it so they want him to stay in the US. I think he could easily go to Europe or Australia. We shall see!

It has been a few weeks since I wrote the first part and it is time to find out where he ended up getting called to! Several people told us they usually found out on a Monday between 10-14 days after submitting their paperwork. When we were in that window we were anticipating it coming on a Monday, so I made some snacks and treats, Matthew put his friends and family on alert to come over Monday night when he opened it. Ryan was going out of town on Wednesday of that week so we were hoping it would come before he left too. Monday came and went…Tuesday came and went. The Stake president checked the status and it said it was still waiting for assignment so we figured it would be the next week on Monday. Wednesday came and went. We had the missionaries in our area over for dinner Wednesday night. They told us a way to check and see if the call was on the way. We did it and it still didn’t show us anything. Thursday evening I was sitting in Emilee’s room talking with her and Matthew called me. When I answered the phone he asked where I was because he had just gotten his call. We were all pretty surprised!

Matt decided he wanted to open his call with just his immediate family first and then read it again when he invited the rest of his family and friends over later. He said in case he was going somewhere lame he didn’t want to open it with everyone first. I think that was maybe a small part of it but I think most of it was he was nervous and wanted to be able to process it a little first. Which is just fine. The bummer part was Ryan was out of town, but he left the conference he was at for a while and found a quiet place he could face time with us.

Once we had Ryan on the phone he opened his call and found out he will be going to the Brazil Recife South Mission!! He starts online training in our home on August 11, 2025 and then will go to the Brazil Training Center on August 20th. I thought it was pretty touching that the day he starts happens to he his brother Aaron’s birthday. I like to think that Aaron will help Matt and be a companion for him throughout his mission from heaven.

After he read his call with us, we invited his friends and family over to read it later that night. We did a zoom call for friends and family that were not here in KC. Several of his baseball and school friends that aren’t members of our church came. It was really cool to see them support him and be excited for him. They all wrote their guesses on a white board before he read it. Many of them stayed for a while after he read it to start researching and finding information out about Recife.

It has been pretty exciting learning and starting to plan for his mission. The first thing we had to do was get the process started for getting his Visa. It take 4-6 months so they want you to get started right away. There were a few little hiccups but we got it done pretty quick and got the paperwork sent in. He will be speaking Portuguese while he is there so he got a few apps on his phone to help him start learning. It is 138 days until he goes from when I am writing this. We have discovered lots of people that have been to Brazil on there mission, some even the same one Matthew will be at, or have family or experience with sending a missionary to Brazil. It is comforting to have there advice and insight. I am sure Matthew will have a lot of amazing experiences and grow a lot. It will be challenging for him. It is exciting, and overwhelming and a little surreal all at the same time. There are a lot of things going on at school between now and when he graduates and the Summer is already starting to fill up. Ryan and I are trying to soak it all in and enjoy and appreciate the last few months with him before he leaves, as much as we can.

Wrestling

Winter was filled with Allison’s wrestling matches. This was Allison’s first High School wrestling season. It is from November to February, if they make state it is a few weeks longer. She initially started on varsity because she beat the girl for her weight class. A few weeks later another girl dropped down to Allison’s weight class and took her spot on varsity and she was bumped to JV. Allison decided to drop down another weight class and then wrestled in that weight class the rest of the season sometimes on varsity sometimes on JV depending on another senior girl wrestler.

I think she did pretty awesome! She didn’t seem to think she did overly great but when she wrestled JV she won most of the time. Two of her meets and one dual she took 1st place. When she wrestled varsity her record was pretty close to 50/50 wins vs losses. That’s were she thought she didn’t do good but as a freshman wrestling mostly Junior and Senior girls with a lot more experience I think that is a great first year.

It is fun to watch her and see her determination and commitment to it. Not just at meets but watching weight and maintaining it where she wants it while conditioning and putting a lot of time into practice between meets. Ryan and I learned a lot more about it too. I am still not an expert but I know how points are scored and more of what the verbiage and things the ref does or says while she is wrestling means. I also figured out how to combine her individual match videos into one so I can have one video instead of a bunch of short ones. Very proud of myself for that.

It was a good season. She loves to be busy so it was good for her to have that. She is contemplating doing track next…

This is a match that was far away so I didn’t make it to watch her but she won 1st place.

Here are a few of her matches. The first one is a dual she won by technical fall which means she won by getting 15 points ahead of her opponent.

This next one is a match that she wrestled seniors every time. She took 7th in her weight class.

The last one is her last JV match of the season and she took 1st place again. She dominated the first match, used her endurance in the second match, and dominated again the third match.

2025 Begins!

January was a typical January this year. There were a lot of social media comments and jokes about how January is a 12 years long, never ends and the most miserable month of the year. I don’t think that. February seems longer to me, ironic since it is the shortest month of the year. I get why people struggle though. It is a long cold and dreary month. I am ready for the calm boringness after several months of go go go with the holidays. We had a few things that spiced the month up though.

RJ and Dani decided we should all go to a show together at the Kaufmann Center downtown. They had never been and it had been a long time for us. We all went to Chicago together. I had seen the movie, never the play. I think the play was a lot better. It was a nice adult date night down town. Allison watched their son and dogs overnight at their house and Matthew and Emilee watched each other so we stayed downtown and used hotel points after the show. It was nice to not have to drive all the way home afterwards.

The following weekend was Ryan’s works holiday party. They rented out a speak easy under the KC Hotel downtown with a roaring twenties theme. It was pretty fun, everyone dressed up and had a good time. We were going to stay in the hotel that night too but mid week Ryan got sick and we didn’t know if we were going to be able to go or not so we canceled it just in case. Luckily he was better and we got to go. It is a pretty fun hotel but I didn’t mind coming home since we had stayed downtown the weekend before. I was talking to the new marketing person Ryan just hired and her spouse. They seemed really familiar and eventually we figured out that they come to my office for dental work, so they reason they looked familiar is because I have cleaned their whole families teeth for the past few years. LOL. Small world. There were some group pictures taken but I didn’t get any copies so I just have the pictures of Ryan and I. I thought we looked pretty good, Emilee thought we looked silly but she clearly doesn’t know how people dressed in the 20’s. Our costumes came with fake cigarettes but we decided to not carry those around all night.

The next weekend we had Grandpa Terry’s 73rd birthday to celebrate! Every year he says he just wants a very simple meal for his birthday dinner with everyone. This year he said he wanted tacos, Ross said that was boring and made chicken fajitas instead. They were very good… I think Roger enjoyed them and ended up being ok with the switch. Rhonda made him a carrot cake-she makes a very good carrot cake-and he blew out all the candles successfully. The Terry family has decided we are going to continue with the decades old tradition of blowing out the candles on a birthday cake despite COVID trying to do away with it. It is kind of gross if you think about it, but we have all survived this long. 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️ I do not have a clue why Allison is holding a candle up in an orange for him to blow out too-I would guess either an inside joke or she didn’t want to eat cake for wrestling reasons and was including her orange in the celebration.

And last but not least for January-for part of the kids Christmas present Ryan got tickets to the Chiefs playoff game…if they made it. Of course they made it to the playoffs. We have gone to the super bowl 6 times in the last 7 years and will probably go again this year. He had four tickets. I was fine with not going because if I watch the game I prefer to do it in the warmth of my living room. IT WAS COLD! Allison had some wrestling stuff she didn’t want to miss so she passed her ticket onto Matthew’s friend Carter. So Emilee, Carter, Matthew and Ryan braved the weather and went to the game. We won and it was a fun game. No one lost any toes or fingers to the cold. The Chiefs hold the record for loudest stadium in the NFL and Emilee said she believes it. She had a fun time with her dad and brother. Next we have to try for a three win in a row at the Super Bowl!

January 2024

If I looked back at my other posts from January I would bet that they say something to the effect that it is kind of a boring month but I love it because after the holidays I need a month of boring.

This year was not different. Relative to our usual schedule of kids activities and normal life events going on it was pretty slow. I loved it, and I needed it! There will still be some rearranging but I was able to go through each room and at least get the initial unpacking and organization done so everything is pretty functional. I did a little more decorating. Found some rugs, got a few things like and end table, bookcase and barstools. I hung up most of the pictures. I want to do another picture wall in the basement but I don’t have a solid plan in my head yet so I just keep thinking about it for now.

An usual change for me though was I got into plants. I like plants but as far as having live plants in my house I have never been interested because the few times I have been given a plant it doesn’t last to long. My sweet mom would give me starter plants after I got married and then they would die. She eventually gave up. I have just not had the desire or energy (I know it doesn’t take a ton but it requires some attention) to take care of them. Maybe now that my kids are older and a little more self sufficient I have enough band width to add some plants. So I did! I love them. They make me happy and don’t feel like a burden at all. The first one I got was a bit of an impulse buy from a store that doesn’t really have plants they just had a few randomly. I say that because so far it is the one that is struggling and I would normally think it was because I don’t really care to figure out why, but that is not the case. I think there was something in the soil or it wasn’t that healthy when I got it. I am still hopeful that it will turn around and make it but time will tell. After I got the first one I went and got a few more. Ryan took one to work and the rest I put around the house. I want to get more but I am making myself wait and not go crazy. The kids think I am a little silly but I like them. They don’t talk back or sass me either! Here are my plants I got. I repotted them and gave them all new soil and food and a nice sunny spot (or not sunny if they prefer) to grow. Three of the four are thriving and growing for sure. Crossing my fingers for the fourth but I am already way ahead of my past track record.

We had a few guests in January! Our first visitor was Sherrie. The girls stayed in Arkansas for a few days with her after New Years so she brought them back up and stayed the night with us.

A few weeks later Ryan’s best friend Mike Johnson came for a weekend. Those two are quite a pair. They love to get as much sports watching, eating, and talking in as they can whenever they get together.

It had been a bit to long since we had gotten out our Terry Family Growin’ Board and measured everyone. We got it out of storage when we moved so we measured the kids in January. Everyone had done some significant growing, Matthew hit a milestone he has been waiting on for a long time. He is the tallest in the family. He officially passed his dad in height. He is still growing so he is hoping to increase that lead by another inch or two.

Allison had two gymnastic meets in January. One at the beginning and one towards the end. The first one she had a few mess ups and wanted to just forget it. She still had some good moments but we can focus on the second one. Here are some pictures. I wish I had a parent photographer that takes amazing pictures for everyone on the team like I had for Matthew’s baseball but so far it is just my limited skills that are available. I tried to get some good action ones because we had pretty good seats at this meet.

Busy Weekends

January was a typical January. Kind of slow. Just the way I like it so we can recover and relax from the busy months before. By the end of January baseball, horse lessons, piano, gymnastics were all up and going. We had lots of things going on each weekend so Ryan and I would divide and concur the best that we could.

Like he does each year, Grandpa Terry started off one of the weekends in January celebrating his birthday. He turned 71. We told him we would make or get any food he wanted for his dinner and strongly hinted at BBQ. He said he wanted to go with easy to get, eat, and clean up so he picked pizza. After asking him 5 times to make sure he really didn’t want BBQ we picked up some pizza (we made sure one had every topping they offer on it just for Grandpa) and we celebrated with dinner followed by cake. His boys and his two oldest grandsons took him on an axe throwing adventure. They all felt very manly and proud of themselves when they got back. Ethan was concerned about not being able to throw the axe far enough and ended up being the best of them at it. Rhonda made a chocolate cake and a cherry cheesecake for him. In true pre-covid fashion we put candles on the cake and he blew them all out. I am all for blowing out candles but I think taking a piece for the birthday person and putting the candles on just their piece to spit on when they blow out is more my style. However, I am often overruled though and called a germ-a-phob or fun hater. All in all I think Grandpa had a fun birthday.

The next day was another big day. Ryan’s biological mom Sherrie, her husband Dave, daughter Genevieve and her son Eric came up to finally meet Rhonda and Roger in person. It has been a highly anticipated meeting since we found Sherrie two years ago. Ryan was a nervous wreck all week. He was really worried Rhonda would change her mind or hurl back handed ‘compliments’ or barely veiled insults when she met Sherrie. The day before they came, Rhonda decided she wanted to call Sherrie and talk with her over the phone first. They said they ended up talking for three hours and it was a great conversation. That put Ryan at ease a little bit and when they arrived in person it went pretty well. We all sat around and talked for a bit then Rhonda and Sherrie kind of split off and talked and looked at photos. Gen and Dave talked with the rest of us and Eric jumped right in to play with Emilee and Jovee. Rhonda and Sherrie just kept talking. Everyone else went to Top Golf and played games. Rhonda told me afterwards that she was really glad she finally met her and she really liked Sherrie. She said she felt like she was talking with a long lost friend. Ryan and I were very happy that they got along and made a friend in each other.

Instead of going golfing with everyone, Allison and I headed to Salina Kansas for a gymnastic tournament. She did a pretty good job. She placed 9th overall, and had one of her best bar routines yet. She is still loving gymnastics. We are proud of her for how hard she works and how much effort she puts into it. Right when we arrived it started snowing so by the time we left a few hours later there was a pretty good snow storm. We had to go a little slower but we were still able to make it home.

Vermin

About a week into the New Year, it was a regular evening. The kids were all at youth night at the church. I sat down to work on a puzzle we had out from Christmas. Ryan said he was going down to the basement to work on the computer. We were set up for a nice relaxing evening after work and the events of the day. A few minutes later Ryan called me to come look at something. After a sigh, one more sip of my hot chocolate and begrudgingly unwrapping from my cocoon of my favorite blanket I went downstairs.

He had found little black things scattered around the top of the desk and couldn’t figure out what they were. We thought they were insects…dirt…crumbs…they weren’t much bigger than a flake of pepper. We weren’t sure, we wiped them up and decided to see if they came back. I went back upstairs, wrapped back up in my cocoon. A few seconds later I snapped a satisfying piece into my puzzle and the words ‘mouse poop’ popped in my head. I have never seen mouse poop so I wasn’t sure. I decided to google it- sure enough that’s what it was. Ryan had the same thought and we both hollered to each other that we thought is was mouse poop at the same time. We looked around and found a few more spots that had evidence of the disgusting rodents. Immediately everything in our clean cozy little house turned to contaminated, dirty, soiled nastiness in my mind. So instead of relaxing and enjoying our evening we cleaned up everything we found, bundled up and went out in the nasty cold weather to Menards to get some mouse traps. I was still hoping it wasn’t mice, Ryan was pretty certain. We decided to buy one of each kind of trap and see which ones worked and get more of those. We told the kids to pick up any messes and no food was allowed anywhere outside the kitchen and dishes had to be done ASAP after eating.

We crawled into bed. Wondering if there were just mice running around the house like they owned the place every night. Then I heard Allison crying in her room. I went to see what was wrong and she was distraught that we were going to torture the mice and kill them. I tried to explain we weren’t torturing them but we were going to kill them. We came to the agreement that we would use traps that killed them immediately or caught them alive and then dad would take them to the field by his work and release them AND provide video evidence of their release. Crisis averted we went to bed.

The next morning we had THREE dead mice!! THREE!! To make matters a little worse the only traps that worked were the sticky pads…not Allison approved. They completely avoided the rest of the traps. That day was spent cleaning, disinfecting, throwing things away, and putting anything the mice might take as food into a plastic storage bin with a lid. We bought a lot more sticky pads. I researched mice and learned way more then I ever wanted to know about them. Allison made it clear that her trust in us was gone and we were murderers. We had a lengthy conversation about why mice are gross and shouldn’t cohabitate with humans. I apologized that we were going to be using the sticky traps. I had not lied to her but now that I had more information then the night before I had to update our plans. She couldn’t get the image out of her head that they would bite there own legs off to get away from the sticky traps. I told her I thought the sticky traps had poison on them or something because the mice were all dead in the morning.

We ended up catching multiple mice several days in a row, for a grand revolting total of seven. I kept thinking I couldn’t believe we had seven mice running around and no idea. More mice than people!!! I don’t think they were here very long though. The week of Christmas it got really cold. Several days of -5 or more. We think that is when they moved in under the sink for warmth. I deep cleaned the entire house before we moved in and never saw any evidence. I had cleaned several times since we moved in and not seen any either. Since we caught number seven we have seen no more evidence and the traps are checked and moved around regularly. Hopefully we are done with the gross disease carrying vermin.

That was the end of the mice drama until about a week after the last mouse was caught. Allison stepped on a sticky trap. She had a shoe on but was concerned she was going to spread poison all over the house.🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Allison’s Adventures

Allison is doing really well in school. Her goal it to work on her time management which makes me very happy. She is a person that evaluates herself and while she might not admit a mistake or shortfall, she makes a conscious effort to change or develop habits that she wants to work on.

In one of her classes they are making a large marble chute on a board. She asked me if I new which one was hers. All but one of them was contained to the board they were given to attach it to. One of them had extensions all over and was only on the board when she wanted to cross over to the other side. I guessed the least contained design and was right. Allison doesn’t like to be contained and that applies to all aspects of her life.

When I took some things into Emilee’s room the other day I found this note on the bathroom door that they share. It has been a while since I have found an Allison note. It made me chuckle. I especially love the ‘probably’ in parenthesis under “I WILL”. The two of them are working out some boundary/sharing issues with their shared bathroom.

Allison had another gymnastic meet this month. Her team took 1st place. She got her personal best in two events. She got a 9.3 on her floor and vault routine. She is progressing in all of her events and doing well. It is fun to watch her improve.

Boys vs Girls Communication

While I was at work the other day on a Thursday afternoon, I got a text from Lisa, she is Matthew’s friend Campbell’s mom. She asked me if I was ok with the schedule for Saturday for pictures and hanging out before and after the dance. Apparently that weekend-in two days, there was a high school dance that Matthew and Campbell were attending with a group of her friends. I told her I was glad she had reached out because I had no idea there was a dance coming up. After her text, I texted Matthew and asked him if he was going to a dance this weekend that he hadn’t mentioned to me yet. He said, “Yep.”

I am finding that Matthew will answer my questions if I ask him very specific questions multiple times. He isn’t much on details. Luckily Lisa and Campbell are, so they fill me in and tell me what is going on. He made it to all the places he needed to be to eat, take pictures, and dance. Campbell told me the dance was more fun this time because people actually danced.

Matthew also had parent teacher conferences. His communication continued to be brief for that as well. His entire presentation had fewer words than Emilee’s or Allison’s had on one page. Between his teacher and I we were able to drag enough information to know what we needed to know. I took a few snap shots of some of his artwork. I am not sure what the stick figure one is, when I asked he said, “An assignment.” 🙂

Emilee’s Events

Emilee had to find a new place to ride horses. The barn she was riding at had a few of their horses pass away and the owner wanted to take some time off from teaching. It took a bit of time to find a new place. Part of the issue was that she only wanted to ride with Reese so we had a find a place that had room for both of them. We finally found a place that wasn’t to much farther away. It seems a little more organized and stream lined than the last barn. Hopefully they will continue to progress in there riding.

While she waited for me to find a new barn for her, she filled her time with playing with her horses at home. She is pretty cute. This heard of horses, barbies and random other stuffed animals can be found around the house in various stages of their daily trek from the fireplace to the office and and back to the fireplace. They always travel together in a pack and they seem to have a fairly organized rotation for taking turns riding on all the different horses. If you are lucky you will catch a little bit of conversation between all of the animals but if they know you are around they move pretty quietly. I love her imagination.

She has also become one of her primary teachers helpers with her baby on Sundays. She loves holding her. The babies name is Maddie and as you can see she is fond of Emilee too.

February is usually parent teacher conferences. For the winter conference they have the students come with their parents and talk with them about what they are doing and learning. Along with her grades (that were very good!) I was sent home with a few of Emilee’s self portraits. One of them was her before she got glasses and the other was after she got them. She has done much better in school and seems to feel more confident going now that she can see. Imagine that. She reads a lot without being asked too. I asked her how she read the board to know what to do. She said, “I just guessed.” I’m glad we figured it out so she can work and learn at her full capacity. Poor girl! She looks pretty cute with her glasses I think!

All three of my kids needed glasses when we went in for this years annual eye check up. Apparently we didn’t eat enough carrots last year. Matthew and Allison only need their glasses in certain situations, Emilee needs hers all the time.

January 2022

This January was a typical January. Not a lot going on. A good month to rest after all the holidays and re-group and plan for the upcoming year. It is a long slow month. I don’t mind though.

Ryan’s work did there usual January Christmas party for the company and their spouses. This year was a little different though because it was also the 10 year anniversary of the company starting. Ryan has been with them since they started so he made a little party planning committee and they put together a fun night for everyone. It was at a hotel in Lawrence Kansas. They had meetings Thursday and Friday and then Friday evening all the spouses came and joined for the party. They had a dinner followed by a casino night. They gave you fake money to play with and you won tickets with your money that you could bid on a bunch of prizes at the end. They did a good job. It was a fun night. Everyone stayed the night in the hotel and went home the next morning. I am glad he works at a company he enjoys and works with good people.

That is about the only event worth reporting in January. February came with a couple good snow storms this year. Ryan’s parents went to Idaho for a while to see Becky and her new baby boy Kaden. We took care of their house for them while they were gone. Ryan told the kids to go over and shovel his driveway. I am a sucker and they talked me into driving them over. Then they found his snow blower and asked if they could use that. I pulled it out and it was easy enough to use so I started using it and told them to shovel. At some point the new phone in my pocket that was less than two weeks old wiggled its way out of my pocket and fell on the ground. The snow hid it and the next time I came around I snow blowed it right up. I thought I had hit a heavy part of snow for a second and then didn’t think much about it. Matthew was standing at the top of the drive way in front of me and noticed a black object flying through the air land at his feet. He looked to see what it was and picked up my phone. It was no longer straight but had a nice arch to it. The phone did not survive its run through the snow blower. The case however came out with barely a scratch on it. I was pretty annoyed. I got to spend three hours of my day to go buy a second new phone. I got the special one for the price of two deal this time.