Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - November 30, 2022

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

We’re ending November with what really isn’t a polar vortex, but it did feel as though December was in the air today as we had fun with school, band practice, and another evening at the lab or archives.  Music with our best friends was definitely the entertainment highlight of our day; and we don’t really have any news from either our academic adventures or from our work at the lab.  It is also time for us to catch up on some sleep tonight; so that’s all we have for today.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - November 29, 2022

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Happy 22^nd Birthday, Rowen!

Cassie, Michael, Tim, and their friends have taken care of making Rowen’s day special – even with the work that includes getting ready for final exams; and we only managed to help out with the gifts we sent with them to give to Rowen this morning.  We didn’t get to talk to her today, but that’s mostly because today was also the Moms’ Christmas shopping day; and our family grandparents headed back to Arizona this morning too.

Our day was not Christmas shopping, travel, or birthday great, but we did have fun at school; and then we had a near-repeat of yesterday with band practice after school and lab or archives time after a Pizzeria pizza dinner with Dad.  We didn’t play at the lab as long as last night, but we also didn’t get home until after Mom did – and had the van unloaded too.  The band practice was a highlight of our day, and while we had fun at the lab too; Ehlana worked on analyzing her experiment data from last night; I continued my work on the archives; and we don’t have anything exciting and newsworthy to offer tonight.

After getting home from the lab, we had a visit with Mom and Dad in the office; came upstairs; and opted for bath or Jacuzzi time before getting around to our bedtime computing and twin chat.  We’re warm and sleepy, but at this point we need to catch up on some recent holiday weekend news or just leave it to others for whatever they’ve written in their archives – so we’ll go with the extra news.

Let’s start with baby and toddler-related news for the family.  We weren’t in the loop for most of that, but Cassie and Michael spent as much time as they could with Jake’s and Rebecca’s kids; and they were really feeling sad about how much they are missing while at college as those kids grow so fast.  That’s true for Violet’s family with Ryan and Emma; and that’s especially-true for Dawn while she’s busy at college too.  This was an away holiday for the Johnson clan, but Christina and Josiah have that same issue with her family – including everything they’re missing with her nieces, nephews, and next-gen cousins.  That’s part of our lives that we don’t write about much, but we’re also really glad that Cassie and Michael are now only about six months away from being home to stay.

That brings us to the latest for their new home build – and the visits they made to the house while home last week.  Their friends got to visit the construction site too, and while there is still a lot of interior work to be done; they are all impressed with what they can see so far.  Basic interior construction continues, so none of the rooms are finished, but all of the roughed-in plumbing and electrical is finished; most of the interior walls and ceilings are installed; and some painting has begun.  The kitchen and bathrooms are projects that are supposed to be done by Christmas; and the current plan is to have the house ready for furniture by spring break.  We didn’t go along for any of those visits, but we do expect to get drafted to help out when it comes time to get their house set up for them so it will be ready for them in May.  We’ll have more on that story as it progresses; so stay tuned for more!

Jaimie and Kaitlyn should get some coverage for their stories with Micah and Jeremy.  We didn’t really spend much time with them over the weekend, and while we would have loved to do more with them; it isn’t surprising that they chose to spend most of their long weekend paired up and doing teen-couple-rated things!  We should add that Uncle Blaine and Aunt Alison are building friendships with Micah’s and Jeremy’s parents; and that’s especially-entertaining with Jeremy’s Mom.  Let’s not get weird about that – the families are just having fun with the jokes; and tween or teen summertime relationships aren’t grounds for any weirdness with parents and their kids.

Moving along, while we have next-gen hometown babies and toddlers, that isn’t true for the visiting Rice and Proctor cousins; so this holiday weekend was different compared to when all of the new Johnson clan kids and their parents are in town.  One thing that is the same is that we didn’t spend much time with the young adult couples while they enjoyed hanging out with Cassie, Michael, and their college friends.  While we missed out on most of that fun; we’re glad that our cousins got to have more fun while with us for the holiday.  Our Rice-family cousins also spent time with Violet, Dillon, and their kids; and we’ll need to adjust for all of that even more from now on as our family time spreads out to more homes.

Okay, that’s enough for tonight.  We didn’t get around to teen and tween gossip from the weekend, but that isn’t anything serious; so we’ll just let it go and at least some of those stories will make it into other parts of the archives – even if that’s only through personal journals of other kid and teen Magi.  Now we just need to crash and nap; so we will!

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - November 28, 2022

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

It’s really late because Ehlana got into an experiment at the lab that she couldn’t leave without finishing; so this is going to be another one of those micro-reports; and we’ll have to try and catch up tomorrow night.  That experiment, by the way, was worth staying late at the lab for; since it was very successful; and takes Ehlana a step closer to a cure for cancer.  That’s amazing – and so is Ehlana, but we’re also talking about a process that will still be years and decades away from that future we want where cancer is relegated to medical history.

We’ll have more on that in future updates too, but we’re also exhausted as well as excited; so let’s get serious about keeping this short so that we can get some sleep.  We missed Cassie and Michael a lot this morning – especially with Tai Chi and at breakfast.  Yes, there was a vid-chat with them at breakfast too, but that really only emphasized that we won’t see them again until their Christmas break starts.  School adventures included new study modules and a lot of holiday weekend gossip, but we’ll have to save up getting into any of that for another time too – or just skip it if we stay this busy.  Naomi and Aiden did a band practice with us after school; we fit in a short bike ride before dark and dinner; and we’ve already mentioned being at the lab – which is what we did from the time we finished the dinner clean-up until about a half-hour ago.  Mom was with us for the final two hours at the lab because she’d come to get us after being late by then; she stayed for the rest of that experiment; brought us home; and now we really don’t need to write about what our parents are doing while we wind down fast toward nap time!  We really do need to sleep while we can; so that’s all for tonight.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - November 27, 2022

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

It’s cooler again today, and some rain overnight left everything wet; so Tai Chi was indoors today – and still awesome thanks to sharing those moments with Cassie, Michael, May, and Lee.  We had a special breakfast too; and then we were busy with getting ready for church, packing vans, and then the teen-led holiday service kept us entertained for a couple of hours – including the social time before and after the extended blast of music and special messages.  Our day felt very compressed with so much going on, but we still moved on pretty much straight from church to the Inn for the noon buffet.  Miranda and Jacob went with the extra buffets today; and Mom picked the first one so that our collegians could still get home with lots of time to get friends to their various apartments and then settle back into their townhome.  We can skip the details like dropping off the rented vans, but they had a safe trip and everyone is apparently happy and ready to get back to classes again on Monday.

Once our weekend guests headed home, we still had some family fun ahead of us – since some of our cousins stayed around until later in the afternoon.  For the Rice clan, that had a lot to do with spending time with Violet and her family; and nobody will be surprised to find out that Jaimie and Kaitlyn were reluctant to say goodbye to Micah and Jeremy.  We did some visiting after a bit of work at home that allowed us to get first loads of laundry started, and while Dad needed to work in the office for the rest of the day; we still had a bit of play time too – including a short bike ride; a band practice; and, eventually, the rounds of goodbyes when our aunts, uncles, and cousins hit the road for their homes.  We got back to work after that; had a leftovers dinner with just Mom and Dad; and kept working into the evening – cleaning bedrooms and bathrooms; keeping up with laundry – especially for towels and bedding; and a bit of family business work.  Bath or Jacuzzi time was ordered at nine-thirty; and now we’re clean, ready for bed, and in need of some quality sleep.  While we were going to offer commentary on weekend drama, we don’t really feel like doing that tonight, so we’ll save that up for tomorrow; and probably be able to add in more news once Ehlana and Naomi get the latest holiday gossip from around school!  For now, that’s all we have; so off to nap-land we go!

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - November 26, 2022

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

A morning visit to the Christmas tree farm was our favorite adventure of the day; and getting to share that with Cassie, Michael, and their college friends – along with a major gang of family and friends – was awesome!  We picked out truckloads of trees; picked up Christmas treats and more at the Christmas store; and then we had all of the trees delivered by the time we stopped for a late lunch at around one o’clock.  Mom and Dad had another gang for that meal; tree-trimming was part of the afternoon fun at many of those homes where the trees were set-up; and that’s what we did at home while also watching football games in the living room.  Since we got to have Cassie and Michael for most of the day; they have been away for dinner and the evening with his family.  While they’ve been out, our evening has been quiet – and welcome; since we were up late last night.  We do not have any ‘kid’ sleepover guests tonight; and our visiting cousins are at other homes for their last night in town.  Naomi and Aiden are busy with their families too; so our post-dinner fun included bath or Jacuzzi time; movies in the lounge; and some chat time with Mom, Dad, and the collegians that chose to go with the quiet time here instead of hanging out elsewhere.

Now we’re ready to crash and nap, so we’ll do that; and offer a deeper commentary on our weekend tomorrow night – after our guests leave and we help out with the piles of work we’ll have once the house is mostly-empty again.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!