Dear Family and Friends, (A Christmas Letter of sorts...)

Hello All! Merry Christmas!

How are you? I hope everyone is doing well.

Time has gotten away from me once again...

So, to catch you up on the doings...

To start with, we are all doing well. We've had the standard colds this year, but no one got the swine flu! We are all still alive! We are happy and enjoying life here in Murrieta. All three girls are doing well in school and are busy with their own friends and activities.

Chad has been working mainly in Modesto for the last six months. He started his own company, Allen Electric, and has been very busy getting it up and running. He still has contacts there in Modesto(/Manteca), and amazingly enough, they are still building houses, a few at a time. He is usually gone about 10 days and home about 4 days, gone for 10, home for 4. He stays with friends, works 14-16 hour days, then crashes on an air mattress. I'm in awe of the things he does for our family. We have discussed moving back, but alas, none of the five of us want that... Here at home, we are busy and miss him in the evenings, but have found a way to make it until he comes home again. The nice thing is that when he is home, he is home.

In general, I have adjusted to this disjointed way of life. Not unlike, I imagine, a woman who is married to a firefighter or truck driver or business person who is gone for days at a time. I have found a way to be okay when he is gone. The girls' various schedules keep me pretty busy and so I don't really have a whole lot of time for dwelling on the fact that he isn't home. We talk on the phone many times a day and I can keep him apprised of all the excitement here at home. Things like Abbey winning the coloring contest in her class, to Emily getting nominated for Freshman Homecoming princess. Progress reports show up great on a text message... The hardest part, I have found is the constant changing of gears. Shannon the Sort-Of-Single-Mom, Shannon the Wife, Shannon the Sort-Of-Single-Mom, Shannon the Wife... It gets difficult to go back and forth. For now...that's just the way it is.

Emily...

Emily is so old now it makes my head hurt. I'm really having a hard time with how quickly the time is passing. She is a freshman now, and my freshman year is the year where I feel like I can remember almost everything with perfect clarity. How on earth is it possible that my kid is that old when I feel like that was me about 3 years ago. Anyway, she is maturing and changing and growing, both physically and emotionally. She is taller that I am. She ran cross country in the fall (I blogged about it here and here)and has already started conditioning for track in the spring. She is doing great in school. I look at her and I can't believe she is MY daughter.

Megan...

Megan, too, is older than I'd ever believe my children would get. Seventh grade for goodness sake! She is a hard worker and is the kid who always comes straight home from school and does her homework without being asked. In August she started taking dance class again. She is IN LOVE with dancing once more. If she isn't doing homework, she is wearing her ipod and dancing. She dances all through the house, on the trampoline, to the mailbox... Her hip-hop class recently danced at the local opening of the Michael Jackson movie. They were amazing. So amazing, in fact that her teacher wants them to start competing. It will be fun to see where this goes.

To see Meg dance, click here. (She is the shortest one on the far right hand side, standing behind the chair. The video is incomplete...we had technical difficulities...)

Abbey...

When Abbey was three, she promised me that she wouldn't grow up. She would stay my little baby forever. Well, that promise is broken. She tells me that it isn't her fault, that God just made her to grow up. She's right, I guess, but I still can't stand it. She is learning algebraic terms and functions. I am almost unable to help her with homework anymore and she is only in fourth grade. Or should I say, "She is already in the fourth grade?" She played soccer this year and LOVED it! After her first practice she told me she was already sure she wanted to sign up again next year. Her team was great. Every girl was a nice person and her coach was amazing. It's been fun watching her fall in love with something because she has never really found that "one thing" before now. She has tried ballet and t-ball, and tumbling and art classes. Not until soccer did we ever see anything resembling passion!

Well, we hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a very Happy 2010! If you are ever in Southern California, we'd love to see you! Come stay with us... we're only an hour from Disneyland!

Love, The Allens

My Hero...

These are pictures from her last two races. I can't believe that I have a runner...

Fire Update

The fire was put out quickly. Approximately 20 acres were burned and no homes were lost. Thank you, Jesus!

Fire in Murrieta

The hill behind our house caught fire today. The response time was so fast. Within minutes, planes dropping fire retardant and helicopters dropping water were on the scene. They did an amazing job of containing the fire. Even now as I type these words, the fire is almost entirely extinguished but the helicopters are continuing to monitor the situation. Please pray for the firefighters and those whose homes are in the vicinity.

The harder the challenge, the greater the reward...

I write this with Emily's permission.



Ok... Where to start?


Sometime last school year, maybe around March or April, Chad and I told Emily we'd like her to choose something to participate in when she started high school. We wanted her to get involved in her school in some way, expand her friendship circle, have less time for texting and the drama that goes along with it, etc. Well, she had briefly shown an interest in running. We suggested the cross country team. She is more of an individual sport kind of person, it would suit her personality. She said she'd think about it. So, as the end of the year approached we asked her what she had decided. She didn't want to do it anymore, but she didn't have any other ideas. So she reluctantly agreed to try cross country. We told her that if she was going to do it, she needed to do it. No quiting... One year. If she hated it she could choose to not do it again next year. She said okay.


Cross country is a fall sport so they start conditioning in the summer, six days a week at 7:00am. Her first day of practice was July 6. This did not thrill her. She went to practice the first day and when I picked her up, she was not happy. She was exhausted, angry, and defeated. She cried and told me she hated it and she wanted to quit. It was too hard, she can't do it. As many of you know, Chad has been working out of town for several months now. He is home a few days and then gone for a week or two. Well, Chad wasn't going to be home for two weeks. I told her that she needed to give it some time. She hadn't been running and needed to give herself some time to get in shape. She had to give it the full two weeks until Chad got home and then we would all sit down and discuss her options.


Let me just say that the next two weeks were some of the toughest parenting weeks of my life. She fought me every morning. She hated getting up early, she hated that she couldn't have sleepovers with her friends, she hated that it was so hard. There were days that I dropped her off and I cried all the way home. Now some of you may be thinking, why fight her then. Just let her quit. Believe me, I was SO tempted to do just that. But months before, when she signed up for the team, Chad and I talked about her possible reactions to the first few weeks of practice. We knew she would hate it and cry and complain. Let's be honest, she doesn't like to work hard (she gets that from me), and she doesn't have a lot of confidence. She doesn't like to try new things. These things we knew and we want her to be better than that. We wanted her to build a little character and develop some work ethic. We wanted her to learn what it is to be part of a team. To cheer on and be cheered on... And honestly, how could I ask her to develop these characteristics if I was unwilling to do my part of the hard work and stand behind her, push a little when she wanted to give up, withstand the emotion behind her exhaustion...


Well, little by little, the runs got easier. She ran more, walked less. We had that talk when Chad got home and she decided to stick it out. When he got home, he went with her on Saturday and ran the "long run" of the week. They ran 5 miles with no walking. She went to Running Camp the following week and had a hard time. They ran twice a day, morning and evening.


There is a big race every year at camp. It's called "Killer Peak." The race is 4 miles uphill with a 1200 foot altitude change from bottom to top. It is a really big deal for everyone on the team. Alumni come back every summer to run it and try to beat their own personal best time. The morning of the race, Chad and I drove up the mountain to watch her run. When we got there, she wasn't feeling well. She didn't run. She wanted to come home. We could see right away that the sickness she was suffering from was homesickness. We were so disappointed. We had been so looking forward to seeing her run. She didn't even try. As soon as she saw us, she could see how disappointed we were. We saw, though, how disappointed she was in herself. As each runner came across the finish line, the whole team would stand and cheer. Once they crossed the finish line and rested for a minute, some of them would run back a few hundred yards and help encourage and run with their friends who were behind them. I was so sad for her. She had robbed herself of this beautiful experience. We talked about what had happened and she decided to try to stick it out at camp. She wasn't feeling 100%, but she would try. She came back a changed person.



Gone were the complaints and the "I can'ts." Gone was the girl who didn't think she could do it. The "long run" for the 5th week of practice was nine miles. She ran the whole thing.


I don't think I can explain to you how wonderful it has been to watch my child literally bloom from a little seed, self protected and doubting to a beautiful flower, full of confidence. She is blossoming as a member of her team.


And it isn't only her attitude about cross country that has been affected. She is more thoughtful, and self-disciplined. She sees more of the world outside her own.


Today was Emily's first Cross Country Race. Chad and I were so excited to see all of her hard work pay off. We wore our "RUN EMILY RUN" custom t-shirts to show our support. We talked to her before the race and she was very nervous. But when the race started, she did such a great job, she surprised us, herself, even her coaches. She didn't just run it to run it. She ran it with purpose. She was in pain, but she didn't let up. One coach said that he loved seeing that she is a competitor. The first 40 runners in each race got a medal. She placed 31 of 120 freshman girls in her heat.





(She is #1512)

This experience has taught all three of us some valuable lessons. First, Chad and I have learned that there are some things worth fighting for and some points worth forcing. We are seeing such a change in our daughter for the better (and she was a great kid before any of this.) I have spent years doubting myself as a parent, wondering if I'm doing the right thing, making the right decision, waiting for some of the payoffs I've always heard were coming. We know now that as parents we usually do know what's best for our child. We can trust ourselves and as long as we are on the same page, we can make it through the challenges that come in raising our kids.

And Emily... She has learned that she is capable of so much more than she thinks she is. That she can't say can't until she's at least given it a try. She's learned that we will stand behind her and push her (if needed) and support her no matter what.

What I hope she's learned most of all, is how much we love her and that we couldn't be prouder.

Soccer...

Abbey is playing her first season of soccer. Her team is red and black. They chose the name "FIRECRACKERS!"

She had four practices and then...bam! Tournament!

Her team played three games this weekend. They won the first two, lost the third.

She's having so much fun that she says she's already thinking about signing up again next year. ;)





(She's #9)

Modern Love

I just finished reading this article in the NY Times called Modern Love
Those Aren’t Fighting Words, Dear By Laura A. Munson.

The article is about a woman whose husband came to her one day and told her he didn't love her anymore, he wasn't sure he ever did. She decided she didn't believe him. She stuck it out. She internally decided to give him six months and waited to see what happened. She went about her life with her children, kept setting his place at the dinner table and waited.

And he came back around.

If only more wives (or husbands for that matter) had the strength to do this. I find it interesting that the article was titled modern love... Have we come full circle? Is this idea of love... waiting and continuing to love someone who is being unloveable such a new idea that it is now modern? Has divorce so permeated our society that it is the normal, expected result? How sad...

In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul writes:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.

What this wife did is the very definition of love. She didn't let her pride get in the way. She didn't let her anger and hurt fester. She didn't hold a grudge. She hoped, she persevered.

I imagine that this must have been one of the most difficult things she had ever done. She must have had moments of horrible pain and frustration. And in no way do I believe that every woman who tries to wait for her husband to work through a tough time will have the same result. Some husbands will still leave. But don't most people stay in a job they hate much longer than six months while they contemplate their options and make a decision. If more people, husbands and wives alike, would give their rocky marriages six months who knows what the definition of Modern Love could be.

Anniversary

Fifteen years ago, today, Chad and I were married. Wow! Fifteen years... How the time has passed in the blink of an eye.

This year we are apart. I am at home in Murrieta. He is working in Modesto. But I think that it almost makes sense this year. Hold on while I explain...

You don't make it to fifteen years of marriage without some ups and downs. You don't make it to fifteen years without learning how to be flexible. You don't make it to fifteen years without learning that marriage takes work and just because you might not be together on the DAY OF, doesn't mean that you don't care anymore. In fact, I believe that it means that we are STILL IN THIS TOGETHER. We are willing to do whatever it takes to make our family work and keep us moving forward. We are willing to make momentary sacrifices for the good of our family. And even though I would love to be on an Hawaiian island with my husband right now, I'll take take just knowing that we both care about the long term. Our marriage, our family, has a future.



I love you, Chad.

Summer...

All summer long I've been feeling guilty about not updating my blog. After spending some time this morning trying to get our summer down on paper, I realize that I've hardly had time to breathe, let alone try to blog...

Here's a little update on what we've been up to this summer...



Started off the summer by painting the shutters and the front door. I painted them a dark espresso brown.


BEFORE:


AFTER:

...Much better!

Emily's friend Elizabeth came from Modesto for a visit. She flew down and we drove her back home.


We visited some of our friends in Modesto. We stayed a few days with the Villanueva's and then stayed with the Proms.


Got to have coffee with some friends that I haven't seen in a few years...


The girls all got to go spend many nights with their friends.




FATHER'S DAY!


We went bowling with the Proms for Father's Day.

We came home to Murrieta for a few days and brought the Prom boys home with us. We spent one day at the beach.

Then back to Modesto for another week. Our friends went on vacation and asked us to house-sit while they were gone. The girls and I went especially so we could spend some quality time with Chad, but we got to spend some more time with friends.

BBQ'd on the 4th of July with the Proms.

Finally, back home to our own beds.

Emily started Cross Country practice on the 6th.

Chad was only home every 2 weeks or so for a weekend at a time. One of his weekends home we went to SEA WORLD!

My aunt, Heather and two of her daughters came for a week long visit. They were able to bring my cousin Haley too! We had a week of "Cousin Craft Camp" at our house.

We made recycled notebooks, bookmarks and clothing designs.

We spent a day sewing.

One day at the beach...

A trip to the mall...

And we wrapped the whole week up with a EXTRA FUN Whole Family BBQ and Swim Party at the Johnson's house.

After our company left, Emily went to Cross Country Camp and Megan and Abbey and I went Back-To-School shopping.

We still have so much going on and summer is almost over. Abbey has started soccer practice. Chad and I will celebrate our 15th Anniversary this week. Emily and Megan have orientation and school pictures on Thursday, and next Wednesday, the 12th, they all go back to school.

Whew...I'm tired...