After our families left I was really down. I was used to having people around all the time, and then Barrett got really busy. He often left as I was waking up and came home in the middle of the night. Occasionally he would come home for dinner for a short time before leaving again. It was the same story on the weekends. He was gone most Saturdays until late, would come to church with us on Sunday, and then would leave again after church until bedtime. In addition to Barrett being alone a lot, Lily had a really rough 2 months. She turned 1 and tantrums started. This was increased by getting all four of her molars in one after another. Somewhere in the middle she got Roseola (who knows how? We hardly went anywhere). So nighttime sleep was very interrupted, with me often having to stay in her room for 30 minutes each time she woke up until she would fall back asleep, or else she would just scream, sometimes bringing her into our bed early in the morning to sleep... and naptime was irregular and short.
It wasn't easy on Barrett too, being away from us all the time, and often he would barely go to sleep before Lily started crying. Everyone has hard times, and in comparison to the many things we could have gone through, this was small. But it was life. And I felt sad and often lonely. (Disclaimer: I should point out that I talked with family regularly who provided support, reading scriptures always boosts the spirits, and I have good friends in Utah and here to talk to and occasionally spend time with, so I wasn't really all alone :))Eventually near Thanksgiving we had some families over for a home teaching night and Barrett shared a spiritual message and talked about his recent struggles with trying to balance everything, explaining a talk he read that helped with that. Everyone left and I said "What?! How come you haven't said anything??" Here I was thinking he was handling everything great while I was breaking down over silly things like a little less sleep and my husband being gone all the time. We were both struggling and trying to cope in our way without thinking how it was affecting the other one. It improved a lot once we talked and tried to adjust in what ways we could. And Lily got over her no sleeping/grumpy phase around the time we left for Utah in December.
Overall, I really think Barrett has done great at managing his time to include a very strenuous program, trying to be here with us, maintain relationships with classmates, and serve in his calling. He doesn't agree with me. But I appreciate the small things like coming home just for dinner when he has to walk right back to the lab after. And activities and date nights here and there help when he's gone several nights in a row. I wanted to record this time to remember that life has times like this. Life isn't just events. That's what is fun to remember and what keeps me going, but pushing through mundane, everyday tasks (and finding the happiness with that) really makes up more of life. During this time I started saying this phrase to myself: "Everything is temporary". This ranged from small things like walking from our parking spot in the snow, to the 6 months we had left with Barrett being gone a lot. Everything really is temporary... except the Gospel and all that encompasses. I am grateful my family isn't temporary and joy isn't temporary, but all the trials of my mortal life, no matter how long they seem at the time, really are. It definitely helped me get through the rut.
Anyway, now that the novel is over. Here are a couple pictures of the fall leaves. It really was beautiful in Maryland with the many, many trees changing colors and the cooler weather.
Once the snow started this winter, it didn't stop for long. But the first snowfall was comical for us. We were at church and it started snowing pretty hard during sacrament meeting. As everyone was gathering up their stuff to go to Sunday School, the Bishop announced that church was cancelled for the rest of the day. What? No way! We have lived through many snowstorms in Utah, but never was church cancelled for them. Here was us driving home from church.
What is nice about snow storms here, is that it often means school is cancelled! Here are some pictures of one of the first snow storms when Barrett stayed home with us on his snow day!
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