Overview of 2016

Usually I get a digital Christmas card out every year. But this year, it just felt too overwhelming to sit down and try to capture an overview of 2016. There was so much - so much beauty, so much adventure, so much learning and growth, so much heartache and exhaustion and stress.

I've recorded the highlights and some of the less-heavy lowlights pretty thoroughly on Instagram here so for a while I thought I'd just leave it to my Instagram feed to share the story of 2016. But then I decided that I really want a written overview of the year combined with some of my favorite photos of the year.

So here it is.

THE KIDS

Above is our traditional on-the-stairs Christmas photo of the kids and below is an overview of what each of them have been doing this year.

As I held my new baby niece the other day, I marveled that my babies are now so darn big. Sometimes I really miss my babies and toddlers and those sweet, funny little people that my kids used to be. Then I count my lucky stars that I now have children who can dress themselves (even if they don't choose outfits I love all the time), go to the bathroom and bathe by themselves (even if their bathrooms are always so much messier than seems necessary), drive themselves places (even if their driving can be pretty darn scary sometimes!), make their own choices (which sometimes results in stressed-out parents and kids learning from mistakes...), and teach me so many new things (about technology, music, drones, football, skateboards, cross country running, track, basketball, Minecraft - and parenting - wow, do they teach me a lot about parenting which in turn teaches me a lot about myself!).

We live in a community where there are quite a few families who are in need of help with their children for various reasons. At least once a week all year, our kids have cheerfully and excitedly taken on the challenge of caring for several small children at our house for several hours at a time. They read stories, play games and have fun teaching the kids new things. They genuinely love these little kids and have never complained or asked for compensation when asked to watch these children. I've found such joy in seeing such beautiful relationships develop between my kids and their dear little friends.

We did a ton of camping and hiking this year and Jared and I were so impressed with the way the kids handled the inevitable tiredness and discomfort. They were great about pitching in to do whatever was needed and about keeping on going when they were tired and hungry. These are some tough kids!

They've certainly had their moments (which sometimes stretch into days and weeks) when they haven't gotten along and sometimes haven't liked each other much. But for the most part, I'm so grateful for the friendship and support the kids show each other and show to me and Jared.

While there have been times over this past year when parenting has been excruciatingly hard and we've all had to learn some things the hard way, we are so grateful for each of our children and for the wonderful people they are becoming.

ASHTON:

• Turned 17 on Jan 3 - but everyone guesses he's more like 21; so strong - can bench press more than his weight
• Doesn't like to smile for pictures
• Junior at Ogden High School
• Earned his Eagle Scout Rank this year (which allowed him to get his driver's license...)
• Worked really hard at football and got quite a bit of time on the field, made lots of friends and was a completely devoted team player
• Honed his videography skills - created some excellent videos on his You Tube channel here, was the videographer and video editor for a self-help website (you can check out the videos he did here), and is now working on a video for each national park we visited last summer as part of the guide I'm writing (will be available in March). Is taking things to a whole new level (literally) and capturing some amazing stuff with his new drone.
• Was a star employee at McDonalds for much of the year and sure learned a lot there (decided it's high time to move on and is looking for a new job now) 
• Taking AP US History and AP Biology plus honors English and math as well as a business development and mobile app development class at school. Working hard and getting excellent grades.
• Excellent snowboarder - likes to crank up his music and do his own thing on the slopes
• Fixes my computer, helps me figure out my phone, helps Jared fix our car issues
• Keeps me up to date on the news and has solid opinions and ideas about so many things plus he has a great sense of humor
• Found a cliff to jump off into a river or lake in just about every national park we visited this last summer (and just about gave his mother a heart attack - again and again!)
• Got his Eagle Scout award last spring
• Can do absolutely anything he sets his mind to do

ISAAC:

• 15 years old; grew about 6 inches this year
• Sophmore; First year at Ogden High
• Turned a corner with his academics and has become such a diligent and successful student; taking AP World History and honors math and English plus enjoying learning new skills - mobile app class with Ashton and a cool technical design class where he got to 3-D print a car design he came up with
• Part of the swim team last season and enjoyed his first year on the high school cross country team this fall, worked hard and made lots of great friends
• Close to getting his Eagle Scout rank
• Just got his driver's learning permit (after months of trying!)
• Excellent skiier - loves skiing with friends and family
• Came in first for his age category for the Olympic distance at the RAGE Triathalon
• Favorite fun friend to so many babies and little kids in our neighborhood and ward
• Really funny - often without meaning to be - good at laughing at himself
• Very social and has lots of great friends who he wants to be with a lot
• Is hard-working and determined

ELIZA:

• 14 years old (as of Feb 13th); as tall as her mom
• 8th grader; second to last year at Ogden Preparatory Academy
• Taking all the honors classes she can, great Spanish speaker, worked extra hard and got straight A's the past two terms
• On student council at school
• Does lots of community service through her membership in the Junior Junior League
• On the junior high basketball team - both JV and Varsity(super fiesty player) and cross country team (super fast runner - got medal after medal) plus runs for another Junior High's track team. 
• Placed in all her Ogden High mountain bike races this fall.
• Great skier who loves skiing on her own or with friends and family.
• Favorite babysitter to many families in our community and always willing and happy to babysit
• Working hard on the Personal Progress program at church and is almost done
• Determined and hard-working, loves to be involved in everything, such a good friend to so many 

OLIVER AND SILAS: 

Silas had to get his appendix out on Christmas Eve

(I tried to write up individual lists for each of them but the lists overlapped so much it just didn't make sense! They are such great friends and really love doing everything together but are OK to do things separately if it works out that way.)

• 12 years old (as of January 14th)
• 6th graders - last year of elementary school
• Working hard in school and getting good grades (other than that C in music that they both are pretty confused about...)
• So excited that they are now ordained deacons at church and that they can now participate in all the youth activities with their big brothers and sister
• Always reading big fat books - mostly fantasy. They enter their own little worlds as they read and it's hard to get their attention!
• Really into Minecraft and Geometry Dash (often found sneaking a little extra computer time...)
• Always climbing something - trees, rocks, walls, you name it.
• Always building something - snow forts, K'nex roller coasters, a clubhouse in the backyard
• Mad trampoline skills
• Have more energy that probably any other human being and are always up for any sort of adventure
• First year running on the cross country team - got better and better throughout the season, Silas got to go to the regional meet
• Super skiers - love the double black diamonds and powder, often making their own trails, they can not only keep up with Jared but lead the way with him these days!
• Peacemakers - these boys are so loving and are always ready with a hug or a kind word when things get tense around here
• Positive - they can always see the good in everything and are great at giving compliments and expressing thanks

SAREN:

Costa Rica

Rocky Mountain National Park

Red Cliffs Reserve

Yosemite National Park (at the top of the tallest falls in North America!)

I spent a lot of this past year running kids around to where they need to be, helping with homework, having important discussions with kids about all sorts of things, keeping up on housework and laundry, feeding people, all that good but often taxing "mom" stuff. I also did lots of Power of Moms work (weekly newsletter, weekly podcast episode, special webinars from time to time, overseeing our great team of volunteers) plus I co-hosted the online Mom Conference again in October and it was awesome to see over 80,000 moms attend this time. Another big project was preparing for, executing and writing the draft of a guide about our month-long camping trip to 12 National Parks (more on that below). 

I love the chance I have to help moms and families but I've felt a real need to cut back on the hours and heavy brainwork that goes into projects that help the larger world so that I can focus more on the little world right around me that matters the most and needs me the most.

For many years now, I've understood, theoretically, and have taught others that it's important to learn to say no to some things so you can say yes to the things that matter most and that moms need to prioritize self-care as you can't draw water from an empty well. For many years now, I've said I need to cut back and I've learned to simplify some things and say no to some things. But over this past year, I've more fully realized that I've been burning the candle at both ends for way too long now and that I need to be serious about cutting back and accepting that I can't do it all and that's OK. 

I'll share more about this later but that's good for now.

JARED:

Jared is still working for ARI, managing software development. His company is in Salt Lake but he works remotely here in Ogden now and is so glad he no longer spends 2+ hours in the car commuting every day (but he is a little behind on his podcasts now...). In addition, he's taken on some interesting side jobs this year and has helped many companies (including the Mom Conference I co-hosted) have the websites they need to best do their work. He is smart and quick and knows how to find a solution to any problem that arises.

Jared has now been the bishop of our ward (congregation) for 4 years. He's helped so many people and has done so much to cultivate an atmosphere of love and acceptance in our very diverse ward. He has so many crazy stories and touching stories! He's a great leader, a wise counselor, and has learned how and where to say no and how and where to say yes to people who need assistance with financial issues and personal problems. 

As far as what he does outside work and bishop stuff, Jared has a great time skiing with the kids or on his own every chance he gets and he's gotten really into crossfit this past year. He won the RAGE Triathalon for his age group this year and had so much fun competing with Isaac there. He's a very loyal Jazz fan (lots of yelling coming from the TV room when a Jazz game is on!) and we've gone to a couple live games as a family this year. Jared spends a lot of time fixing things around the house and fixing our cars, usually with one of the kids at his side, learning and helping.  He's the kids' most loyal fan and has spent a LOT of time this past year at their football games, basketball games, and cross country meets. 

Jared is amazingly selfless and hard-working and never complains. I'm constantly impressed by Jared!

BIG TRIPS:

Costa Rica

Long ago, Jared and I decided it would be great to take each of our kids on a special trip when they were about 12. Ashton got to go to Australia with me when he was 12 and it was a grand trip and great bonding. We realized last year that somehow we hadn't quite got around to taking Isaac or Eliza on their 12-year-old trips. As they're such great friends and as both Jared and I wanted to enjoy an adventure, we decided Jared and I would take both Eliza and Isaac together on a special trip. We all agreed on Costa Rica and it was a really wonderful trip - white-water rafting, zip lining, playing with monkeys, hiking through the jungle, swimming in waterfalls, enjoying the beach.

My parents were kind enough to take care of Oliver, Silas and Ashton and they sure showed them an excellent time.

More pictures are here

Park-to-Park Trip 

We spent a solid month traveling to the 12 national parks that were part of the original Park to Park Highway built a hundred years ago. We camped - in tents - the whole time and while there was certainly some discomfort and a lot of dirt to put up with, we saw incredible beauty, had excellent adventures, and enjoyed some quality family time.

More pictures are here

Podcast about why we went and what the trip did for us here - "Why Families Need Nature"

London

I got to go on a special trip to London with my sister Saydi to help our baby sister Charity (who lives in London) prepare for her first baby (and have fun together in a city we all love so much!)

More photos of the London trip here


In addition to those three big trips, we had some great little trips and loved our traditional time in Ashton, Idaho with Looslis and at Bear Lake with Eyres.

As usual, we spent the 4th of July in Ashton Idaho (Loosli family fun run, kids riding in the parade, watermelon-eating contest, water sports out at the cabin, tractor rides, etc.). This year was extra wonderful as EVERY member of the family was able to come and celebrate Jared's mom's 80th birthday as part of the 4th of July gathering.

As usual, we spent most of the rest of July at Bear Lake with all the Eyres (well, almost all, my baby sister Charity was in London with her husband, giving birth to their first baby). Our family was in charge of the reunion this year. We worked hard and every kid was in charge of a different activity and they did a beautiful job! Eliza ran the family relay race and the sand castle building contest. Isaac ran the Eyrealm Olympics as well as the dam building contest, Ashton managed the photo contest and slide show plus the bonfire and made the playlist with everyone's favorite songs for the year on it. Oliver was in charge of the talent show. Silas took care of the secret service challenge. Jared and I just helped the kids and ordered the t-shirts (oh, and I coordinated all the food which is no small feat...). Everything turned out great! But I'm glad it won't be our turn to run the reunion again for 9 years!

More pictures of Bear Lake here.

Thanks for caring enough to get to the end of this! Here's to a great 2017!

Kindness and Beauty

I'm so grateful for the kind and encouraging comments on my last post. We live in a world where there is plenty of ugliness and each of us see and experience things on a personal level that can be painful and challenging. But there are bright spots of beauty and kindness that make such a difference. Today I want to celebrate a few of the bright spots that have really helped me in the past couple months.

In response to a couple of my posts, I received a beautiful card full of such helpful and loving encouragement in the mail. It came all the way from England (at least I'm pretty sure the stamps were British stamps...) and included no return address or last name. Stephanie, if you're reading this, thank you so very much. Your wise words gave me added strength and perspective. Yes, things are not generally as bad as they seem when you're in the thick of something that seems impossibly hard. Yes, there are more things we can do about hard times and issues than we may initially realize (it is taking time and prayer and pondering and trial and error but I'm finding helpful things that I can do about some of the hard things I'm dealing with). And yes, once we get through something hard (or through a little section of something hard), the "new normal" can be really beautiful in its own right. Thank you thank you thank you for these important reminders. And thanks for the reminder that the kindness and concern of strangers is such a beautiful and inspiring thing.

Here's what I got in the mail:

In the midst of the the crazy long-days (and nights) of getting the Mom Conference together (wow, September and October were INTENSE - I spent pretty much every waking moment that the kids didn't really need attention working on all the little and big details of the conference), I was touched to have a beautiful basket of fall flowers delivered to my door courtesy of my always-thoughtful mom. Having those flowers right behind my laptop screen as I sat here hour after hour gave me a much-needed reminder of love and beauty in the midst of the tedious and consuming work that needed to be done. (By the way, things came together beautifully in the end and we had over 80,000 moms attend!)

At the close of the conference, we received so many emails thanking us for making this conference happen. This one brought tears to my eyes:

"I just wanted to thank you so very much for all the hard work and time you put into making this conference wonderful.  I am sure it was a huge thing.  I wanted you to know I saw the link on facebook about 1/2 way through the first day and thought I would just try it.  WoW! The first few videos I watched answered so many prayers and concerns I have been having.  I started crying! I stayed up til the last minute ran out to watch them all.  I cannot express how grateful I am to you all for being such a positive influence in the world for good.  I don't know how often you are going to do this but it is so very valuable! I will make sure to blast it out to everyone I know.   Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.  And I hope that when you are having a hard day as a mom and wondering if you ever make a difference you will think of me because you made a difference in my life; probably forever."

-Kat Loiseau (Washington State)
Along with kindness, I'm so grateful for beauty. On the hardest days, there is a spectacular sunset or a gorgeous display of leaves or an extra-blue sky or a perfect little flower growing in an unexpected place to remind me that God loves me and He's watching out for me. Beauty is so intertwined with love for me. Whether it's the crunch of leaves underfoot and the golden shimmer of leaves above on a quick walk around the neighborhood, the sweeping grandeur of the scene at the top of a mountain, or a lovely sunrise as I drive kids to school, the beauty of nature always feeds my soul and reminds me of God's love and presence and the fact that He is there for me. It also offers me perspective and gives me a moment of "awe" - and awe helps us be kinder and happier (read this article or check out this podcast episode I did recently for more on why awe is so important).

I've been doing my regular weekly hiking with friends and the good conversations and beauty those hikes offer have got me through a lot. A couple weeks ago, I went down to Moab/Arches National Park with a couple good friends and enjoyed a day and a half of gorgeous hikes through whimsical landscapes where the red rocks contrasted perfectly with the blue, blue skies. We talked and talked about the deep and the simple and laughed and just had a perfect little get-away. I came back feeling refreshed on so many levels.

 

On Wednesday, I felt like I needed some serious soul soothing and time away from society after the craziness of the elections. So Oliver, Silas and I spent the day out on Antelope Island where practically the only living creatures we saw were bison and deer. We had such a nice time talking together as we climbed the highest peak (Frary Peak) on the island and the raw, stark beauty and 360 degree views helped me gain perspective and feel better about everything.

We left the island just as the sun was going down.

Life can sure be hard sometimes but when we look for the kindness and the beauty, it's there for us and can offer us great hope.

The latest with me

I've got like 20 drafts of posts that I just never quite get around to polishing and posting. I've got some great photos and info on our National Parks trip, an almost-finished post with tons of great info on Costa Rica for anyone who may ever want to go there. And lots of rambling draft posts about the things I'm worried about and what I've been thinking about and learning.

I used to blog so regularly and I love looking back and remembering the cute things the kids said and did alongside the big and small moments of my life over the years. A few years back, it was all very well and good to post about the crazy messes the twins made when they were toddlers or post about the cute and funny things Eliza used to say or share challenges I was going through with various kids in a way that didn't really identify which child I was talking about.  But now that my kids are older, I need to respect their privacy and there are often issues going on that are far too personal to share so I don't post about the challenging things that they do or my concerns about them.  I just post on Instagram about the great things they do and the beauty and happy times in our lives with a very occasional picture/post about something hard but not very personal. And so much of what I'm going through in the past couple years is stuff that is very personal to me so I try to process it through my rambling unpublished blog posts and my personal journal rather than processing it online as I used to do back when my issues seemed huge but now seem quite tame in comparison to what's hit me in the past few years. I'm OK. Or at least I think I'm OK. But sometimes I'm not sure!

I guess to anyone looking at my life from the outside, it would seem that everything is just wonderful. Successful active kids. Beautiful hikes. Great family reunions. Wonderful things going on at Power of Moms. Lots of fun family trips. And while these things are all true and are all things I am so grateful for and want to remember and share, they are not the full story. Pretty much no one shares their full story on social media or even in really private conversations. The longer I live and the more people I talk to, the more I realize that the vast majority of people, like me, have a full story that contains some really crazy hard parts. And I think one of the reasons that so many popular "mommy blogs" are written by moms with younger children is that it's easier to share what's going on when your children are small and the hard stuff, while still very very hard, is often stuff that doesn't need to be kept private.

We might post about things that are tough sometimes, but when our hearts are broken due to challenging relationships or mental health issues or places where we feel like a failure, we don't generally blog about it or post about it on Instragram or Facebook. That's the time we often go inside ourselves and feel pretty lost and sometimes quite hopeless. We get to the point where we don't know what to say even if we did feel comfortable saying something. During this time, we post happy pictures and successful moments so that we can count our blessings and celebrate the good in our lives. When we seek the good, we can feel much better about our lives. There is so much good. And that goodness helps the bad stuff feel more bearable. But sometimes, as we're posting about good things, we're just putting on a brave and happy face while we're really struggling with various things.

Anyway, the past year has had some really really hard stuff for me as well as some pretty hard stuff and some great stuff. And maybe it will be helpful to someone out there to know that they're not alone if they're feeling sort of hopeless and lost at times. It happens to the best of us.

One of the things that really helps me in the hard patches is having something really meaningful to take my mind off my worries. The hard part is that the meaningful stuff I do often becomes overwhelming so that it adds to my worries! But I'm learning, bit by bit, how to draw boundaries around my meaningful work so that I can also have time for meaningful fun and meaningful rest.

Here's the meaningful work I've been doing lately:

I'm really excited about our speakers this year - 20 really amazing topics presented by 20 top-notch speakers. I'm so glad I get to be part of presenting these messages to all the moms in the world who, like me, are struggling with various things. I love that the conference is FREE and that moms can watch from home w/o having to get a babysitter. I loved hearing from so many moms last year who said that they found answers to some of their most pressing questions and worries when they watched last year's conference and I'm sure it'll be the same this year. I know I found answers to some of my pressing questions when I conducted my interviews for the conference.

If you haven't registered already, please do. You'll be richly rewarded. And please share this with all the moms you know - it might be an answer to prayer for some of them.

REGISTER HERE


Anyway,

Our Crazy and Wonderful National Parks Adventure

As I type this, I (Saren) am in the car with my husband and five kids (ages 11-16) driving from Mount Rainier National Park to Crater Lake National Park. Before Mount Rainier, we visited Rocky Mountain National Park for a couple days, then Yellowstone for a couple days, then Glacier National Park for a couple days. We've seen amazing sites, we've set up and taken down camp 4 times (quite a process each time!), we've slept in tents 8 nights, we've been able to shower a grand total of 2 times. We've got our fingers crossed that there will be laundry facilities at the next park as our clean clothing options are getting pretty sparse.

When we get done at Crater Lake, we'll go on to Lassen Volcanic National Park, then Yosemite, Then Kings Canyon, Sequoia, Zion, Grand Canyon and Mesa Verde. By the time we sleep in our beds again, we will have visited all 12 national parks that existed in the west back when the National Park Service was founded 100 years ago.

Why are we doing this? Well, it all started when some good friends planned a month-long trip that would follow the old Park-to-Park Highway and invited us to come along and celebrate the centennial of the National Parks System with them. My first thought was, "That would be really cool but there's no way my husband could get that much time off work or that I could leave Power of Moms for that long and the kids would have to miss the first couple days of school and camping for a full month would be a lot more camping than I'd really enjoy." 

But as Jared and I talked through this idea, it just started to feel right - and doable. We've had so many of these national parks on our bucket list and we only have one more summer after this summer with our oldest before he heads off to college. We've been craving some solid family time as all the kids have been busy with their own separate things - sports, jobs, friends, etc. Being out in nature and hiking with our kids is a major part of our family culture and some of our best memories come from time we've spent together outdoors. 

So Jared talked to his work and figured out a plan for how he could take some vacation days and then work in the car on the days we'd be travelling from park to park. I realized I could use this trip to do something I've been wanting to do forever - write a National Parks Guide for Families for Power of Moms - and decided I could keep up on my other Power of Moms work during our car time (good thing Ashton is such a great driver so he can drive while we work!). And I decided that if it's right for our family, I can make anything work - even a solid month of sleeping in a tent and cooking on a camp stove and dealing with all the little discomforts involved in camping!

So here we are on the road to Crater Lake (amazing that this internet hotspot we picked up at Walmart is working in the middle of nowhere!).

This trip has been all that we hoped for so far - and more. We've experienced some amazingly gorgeous places together and created some wonderful memories (see lots of it on Instagram @sarenloosli if you like). Sure, there have been plenty of squabbles and some complaining and some grumpiness from lack of sleep or hunger here and there. Of course, some things haven't gone as planned - like yesterday when I insisted we do this supposedly-amazing hike that was supposed to go to a fabulous viewpoint of Mount Rainier and the kids complained that it was sort of rainy and they didn't want to go on another long hike so I got all huffy and told them they were being so ungrateful and they simmered down and we got going on the hike only to find ourselves hiking through a crazy hail storm on Mount Rainier. Then once we got to the top of this hard hike, we couldn't see a thing from the vista point due to all the clouds! Then when we were almost back to the beginning of the trail, Mount Rainier popped out of the clouds in all it's glacial glory and we were all so excited!

As we leave each park, I've been posting some highlight photos ON INSTAGRAM HERE and typing up detailed information about what we did and what advice I'd give to other families wanting to visit that park. I've taken tons of photos and my son Ashton has taken lots of video footage that he's making into short films showing what we did and offering suggestions for others (he's so good at video editing and makes great use of his Go-Pro).

Why am I telling you all this? Because I'm hoping you'll be excited about this new National Parks Guide for Families that will result from all this and hopefully help your family experience some of the great stuff we're experiencing some day. And because I'd love your help!

Please click on the link below to learn more about this trip and the guide I'm writing and add your comments about YOUR favorite things to do and see at the 12 parks included in our itinerary. You can add comments on this blog post or on the post linked below.

Input for National Parks Guide for Families

So much of what we've done so far has been thanks to recommendations from commenters on the post linked above and comments from those who follow me on Instagram. And I'm sure there are many things I should be including in the guide for each park that I won't have a chance to experience myself but that I can include in the guide thanks to the information you provide to me.

Wish me luck as we continue this crazy trip! I'll keep you updated on how things go on Instagram @sarenloosli or follow our group's official Instagram feed @parktopark.us

Have a wonderful week (and enjoy your shower and kitchen and bed for me, will you?)