the best dang farewell talk

Marcus' farewell talk totally rocked. He was constantly shifting between NT and BOM scriptures and linking them together so well. He is ridiculously ready to go. My favorite part of his talk:

My parents have been living examples of faith. And not just faith in the Lord. They showed incredible faith in me, even when I didn't have much in myself. Back when I was still thinking about whether or not I would serve a mission, one day I was having car trouble. I was talking to my dad about it. "Marcus," he said, "it's time for you to stop worrying about things with four wheels and start worrying about things with two." I took his advice and got a motorcycle.

He may have taken an extra year, but now his time is here. Even if Marcus questioned whether or not he'd go, none of the rest of us did. We knew him too well -- knew who he was past the fog of Amanda.


So, the talk was incredible. Showing off Betsy was great, too -- and so was being off duty while various friends, neighbors, and relatives all took their turns holding her. Kate especially loves Betsy. She can't get enough of her. And Marcus has been soaking in all the time with her he can. It makes me so happy to see him enjoying her -- and so sad to think of how much we'll miss him. Especially that Tanamo.

We'll take him to the Empty Sea tomorrow and say goodbye. I'm glad he's going, but saying goodbye still (always) bites.

Who Let the Dogs Out?

So, it's the weekend before Marcus' farewell. It's a delicious, summery Saturday night, and the Costantino fam decides to go see a flick or two at the drive-in. Dad is grilling hot dogs to take, Marcus is playing with the babe, and Mickelle is whining that both films are totally guy movies that she's not too interested in. (The Hulk?!? Seriously.)

So, Mom looks out the sliding glass doors and mentions someone is having a backyard fire. Actually, it looks a little big. Yeah, that's a bit of smoke. So she calls Dad, Scott, and Chase and sends them over to check it out. Before they've even made it out the door it is totally obvious that something not good is going on. And it's going on just across the street.

Nobody is home at this hot, happening house. Old Bro. Yorgousen has called 9-1-1, so he and Dad and Chase start to man a hose or two. Scott checks out the home's windows and sees two dogs frantically yapping through one of them. So he jams the windows open and the first dog comes sailing out. The second needed a practice jump or two, but he showed marvelous persistence when it came to not dying. And both of them ran far, far away as soon as they were out, not returning for a full hour.

I watched from a short distance, viewing the side of their house opposite to the fire. Scott says the flames were 12 - 14 feet high, but all I saw was the billowing smoke and the fire on the eves of the roof. By the time Betsy and I made it to the front of the house, the fire was mostly put out. And even when I did go, the smoke was bad enough that I took her back home instantly.


It took the firetruck 17 minutes to get there. By the time they did, the outside deck, kitchen and living room were both totally lost along with much of the roof. The rest of the house sustained severe water damage.

Quite an adventurous evening, no?

Whaddaya think, Missy?

I took photos for Missy yesterday and, since photo quality is lost through e-mails, I thought I'd post them here for her to see.

Name That Vacation Spot...

Valuable Lessons from Teaching, pt. I

There remains only one week of school left in my career as a teacher.

I mean, who's to say I won't ever go back to teaching? There were so many students I just fell head-over-heels for. So many lessons I loved teaching. So many books I loved submerging into with my students.

But, you know what gets me -- what really sucked my enthusiasm? Feeling like a failure after the endless hours of hard work. I've had countless cathartic conversations with Jen F. about this. (Oooh, note my beautiful alliteration.)

Some people are total cowards. My principal happens to be one of them. Especially when it comes to sticking up for his teachers. So, when some not-so-bright parent comes in to totally thrash on the teacher, he always sides with the parents.

Now, I know I sound harsh here, but you have to understand something about me: I really, really, really want to get to the truth of the truth of the truth. I want to figure out where I've fallen short, and I always try to fix it and do better. I don't want to be one of those people with glaring flaws everyone but me can see.

However, I have come to the understanding that sometimes -- sometimes -- I am blameless or nearly blameless. And I've only come to that conclusion after weeks/months of sincere pondering.

But Mr. Principal always -- mm-hmm, always -- sides with the parents. Even when the parent is a total nit-wit. And there really are nit-wits out there. (Yes, it's taken me hours of pondering to come to this grand conclusion as well.) For instance, I've come across parents who tell the teacher to spray their child with a water bottle when he misbehaves. Or parents who defend a child who has cheated. Or who wants the child to make up all their missing work from several months ago in the previous term and receive full credit for it. Yes, all these people are right. And I am always wrong.

After putting in countless hours of hard work -- and more importantly, giving the best my heart has to offer -- I am wrong, and Mr. Principal admonishes me to learn a valuable lesson from my failure.

Teaching has taught me endless lessons. But, unfortunately, the two lessons standing out at the end of this year are that (1) some people are cowards, and (2) sometimes, I am right.

Watch out, she's back on her soapbox.

When it comes to parenting -- well, maybe when it comes to more than just that -- I like to see things done naturally. That is to say, the way they've been done for thousands of years in thousands of places up until someone in America decided technology could improve God's design.

For instance, sleepingwith your baby. I was reading the wikipedia article, "Co-sleeping is standard practice in many parts of the world outside of North America, Europe and Australia, although even in these countries children sometimes crawl into bed with their parents. One 2006 study of children age 3-10 in India reported 93% of children co-sleeping.^[1] Co-sleeping was widely practiced in all areas up until the 19th century, until the advent of giving the child his or her own room and the crib." (emphasis added.) I especially like the last sentence. The reason everything changed -- after being the same for thousands of years -- was some victorian-era know-it-all.

How fascinating. Now, at this point, I should probably take a moment to make sure you know I'm not a radical on this issue. Really. In fact, I never planned on having Betsy sleep with us. It just happened. I could tell it was what made her the most comfortable. At the time, I was very nervous about it, but the idea has grown on me in a big way.



Motherhood is certainly a job. And it's not the kind with lots of rewards. And, if we're being honest here, it's totally redundant. Every day, people just keep needing clean clothes. And wanting food. And eating on dishes. And, gosh darn it, that baby keeps crying. Every day. Speaking of her, Betsy stops me short in my tracks. It doesn't matter who's over or what game we're playing or what plans I made, when she needs to eat, my world stops. That's just how it is. When she cries, when she needs a diaper change... I stop. My life just really isn't my own.

That's not to say that I don't like motherhood, but I'm making the point here that it is a change. A big one.

So, some days wear you out. Just an ornery hour can wear you out. But that crazy snuggle-at-night time just overwhelms me. Her tiny body, breathing in so lightly, trusting me so completely. Her toes, meeting me at the waist. Her middle-of-the-night hiccups. In the silence of night, I am strengthened. I am renewed. I'm ready to take care of the cries and the diapers and, especially, to sacrifice my own will for hers.

I love feeding her. I love playing with her. But my absolute favorite time is when I contort my body into a "C" to snuggle up next to her. It's my reward. And it's better than any reward any office could offer.

This morning, I spent 20 minutes this morning just snuggling her, watching her drift in and out of sleep. Watching her, I just couldn't wait for her to wake up. So I guess I'll be ready for her cries.

There might be trouble down the road, when we have to wean her from sleeping with us. But for now, we both just love going to bed. (Okay, maybe we've always liked it.)

Playing Mr. Mom

Playing Mr. Mom is about what I expected it to be. It gets a little scary when I am running back and forth from home to Mickelle's school to pick up milk, but so far Betsy has been a good sport about it. Mickelle gets the "Monday Morning Blues" about Sunday night at 5pm. It is a bit of a weird feeling knowing that I do not have a set time to wake up the next day or a huge list of things to do for homework. I feel a bit of a slacker, but when Betsy cries I'm always there to calm, feed, and take care of her. I really like this time I have with her. I feel like I do not have to be one of those Dads whos baby starts to cry and he hands it over to the Mom. I want my baby to feel just as comfortable with me and she does with Mickelle. So, instead of trying to cram a million things into the time I am home with Betsy, I play with her, bounce her, and make her laugh. I can already see the effects and only wish I had more time to spend with my little girl. I want a job I cna work from home, and be there when my kids come through the door telling about their day. I want a job that I don't have to spend 50 hours a week at just to stay on top of things. And then I look at what businesses are requiring and I don't know how I can get one of those jobs. The only way I can think of accomplishing it, is to start my own business and hope it's successful. In the end, does the job matter anyway? It's all about the family.