Pushing myself...

I have been working really hard this year to push myself out of my comfort zones and try to do things that  I normally would be too afraid to try. The exercising, the dieting, I ate tomatoes....

To that end I have entered a project in a crafting contest. Normally I would maybe have entered and then not told anyone so that if I crash and burn I can go quietly away and lick my wounds in private. But I am going to push past the fear of failing and share the fact that I am trying with you all. I am proud of what I designed for this contest and even if I don't make it past the auditions I wouldn't change anything that I have created.  

I can't tell you which project is mine. You'll just have to guess. 

And now I have posted this everywhere I possibly can, shared it with as many people as I possibly can reach. If I fail, then I'll fail spectacularly publicly. But as long as the people I make things for love them, I guess it's not really a failure.

This is only funny if you know my dad...

Tonight as we were driving between the grandparents' houses I sneezed. For whatever reason Lila found that hilarious and started to pretend sneeze. Which made the other two children laugh and start pretend sneezing too. After a couple of minutes of this I said, "Okay. Okay. Now everybody sneeze like Pa Dave."  And all three children promptly went, "Ah-chewie!"  (That is seriously how my dad sneezes, and it is hilarious.)

Infomercials rock...

Especially if you get to watch them with an opinionated seven year old. We were watching a show and a infomercial for Pajama Jeans came on. Have you seen this?  "All the style of jeans with the comfort of pajamas! You'll want to live in them!"  Jake's response, "I'm going to stop looking at butts and read my book."

Lila funnies...

Lila has been the queen of the mood swing today (I didn't even know that was possible at two) but when she has been happy she has also been quite funny.

We went to Wal-mart after we dropped Evie off at preschool this morning. Lila was in a happy talkative mood for most of the shopping trip, telling me all about everything that caught her attention. When we were checking out she was standing in the back of the cart so I could hand her the bags and she could put them in. As I was digging in my purse for my wallet, she looked at the bags, realized there was no room for her to sit down and loudly proclaimed, "This stressing me out!" The checker was still laughing as we left the store...

I was waiting for her to wake up from her nap so I could make a trip to Costco.  (I really try to avoid that place on Saturdays.)  It was almost 4 pm and she was still snoozing, so I decided that she had napped long enough and went in to wake her up.  She was being a stinkbug, sleeping with her knees tucked to her chest and her little bum up in the air. (Side note: What age do kids finally realize that position isn't comfortable and stop sleeping like that? I've never seen a grown up sleep like that... that would be really funny though.) I said, "Time to wake stinkbug." She rolled over, sat up, looked at me and said, "Moooo-ooom. I just napping here."  And flopped back onto her face.

It's a good thing she is so cute and funny. It helps me want to keep her around even when she's making pull out my hair!

Reviewing my goals...

I sat down to post tonight and drew a blank.  So I started looking over some of my older posts, and thought it might be a good time to review my progress (or lack thereof) on my New Year's Resolutions...

...to start making this year's Christmas presents starting tomorrow. I hit a few after Christmas sales and have a few things put away. But the making, not so much...

...to be part of reading a million pages. 5855 pages

...to try to count to ten a little slower when dealing with my children. I am going to focus tomorrow on remembering to count to ten.

...to say "no" less and "yes" more when they ask me to play with them. With the exception of video games (which make me have motion sickness) this one has had some slight improvement, I could still do better.

...to show them everyday that they are more important than anything else going on in my world. Hmmm, well today Evie and Lila were playing house and Evie asked Lila to make dinner. Lila replied, "I can't. Sorry. I knitting."  If we go off that example I have some work to do...

...to be a better wife and occasionally ironing some of my husband's work shirts. I bought Brian an iron and an ironing board and cleaned out the upstairs closet so it can be pulled out easily and he can iron his own shirts. I consider this a successful compromise.

...to get a current family portrait taken. Done! Thanks Josh.

...to knit something for myself that isn't a pair of socks. I declared February the "Month of Me" and made myself a scarf, two hats, and have started a pair of socks. 

...to not have ANY library fines this year.  I just got a second overdue notice in my email today, so that one is pretty much blown.

...to reinstate the daily chores system that worked this summer, so my house is always ready to have friends over. Big fat fail. I am mostly just trying to keep chaos at bay. I will keep trying though...

...to have friends over more often. Well, we had the baby shower last week. But other than that we've been dealing with sick kids a lot, which tends to discourage visitors. 

...to make sure I stay healthy and strong enough to take care of my family. I've lost 10 lbs. in the last three weeks. I definitely feel more healthy and strong! 

...to write a post on this blog every day. So far, so good. I am enjoying the habit of daily journaling, writing is good therapy...

There we are. Two months in, some done, some in progress, some that I will be taking another stab at. I am satisfied with where I am right now, and that is a really good feeling to have.

"Life isn't about finding yourself, it's about creating who you want to be."  I love this quote. I find it very empowering as I am working on making myself the best me I can be.

The binkie dilemma...

I have been trying really hard lately to start breaking Lila of the binkie habit.  This girl has a serious oral fixation. There is always something in her mouth! I must have told her at least twenty times today to get her fingers out of her mouth. And she isn't even sucking on them, she chews on them. It looks painful to me, but I guess as long as it is not my fingers....

I take the binkie away when she wakes up and put it out of sight. I was hoping it would be out of sight out of mind, but no such luck. She asks for it constantly.  I just tell her that binkies are for sleeping time and ask if she wants to take a nap. Since she has an equally serious nap aversion, this is working so far.  I also won't talk to her if she has a binkie in her mouth, I say that I can't understand her and tell her to take it out. This worked really well with Jake, but as I am rapidly discovering Lila is cut from a whole other cloth.  

I came into the toy room to find her kicked back, relaxed and happily chewing on a substitute.

It's a lid to a tea pot, but I have to admit that the shape is a bit suggestive... kind of disturbing actually.

So my dilemma:

 I can't decide if this is something I should really dig my heels in about, or ease up on the binkie control so that she stops chewing on toys. Opinions? Thoughts? Practical advice? 

You'd think by the third go around I'd be a seasoned pro at all this parenting stuff. I guess every child is a new experience and they can come hard wired so differently that what works with one won't necessarily work for another. Honestly, like this job isn't hard enough...

I need more of me...

You know those days when you are just not enough. You don't have enough time, energy, patience, hands, or brain cells. It's days like this that I think the people of India were on to something with their many-armed goddess. If I had more hands I probably wouldn't have put a t.v. set through the laundry room door. A little more patience probably wouldn't hurt either.

Family Fun Day

Today we took the kids to the Living Planet Aquarium. We'd never been before. My overall opinion; not bad, but a little pricey for what you get.  Also, do not attempt to go on a holiday as half of the state will also have the same idea. We were sad that we didn't get to see the penguins at all because we weren't willing to wait in line for an hour and then jockey for position...

But the good points:

The kids really liked looking at all the fish. 

 I really liked the built in steps in front of each display window which meant I didn't have to keep lifting a 26 lb. toddler up to see.

The frogs were my kids favorite. 

Evie and Lila checking out more frogs...

Jake was also very interested by the brine shrimp and the boat where you could pretend to drive and learn more about brine shrimping in the Great Salt Lake.

Of course that meant Evie needed a turn...

And Lila too. 

(She spent her turn whining that she couldn't really reach the steering wheel. I think she was afraid she was going to fall off the chair.)

More frogs. Evie was showing me how a frog catches food by sticking it's tongue way out. I couldn't snap a picture fast enough to catch her sticking hers out.

After the aquarium we decided we weren't quite ready to head home, so we found a matinee showing of Tangled. Brian hadn't seen it yet and Evie and Lila were beside themselves with excitement to get to go see it again. I was really impressed that Lila sat on a chair and (mostly) quietly watched the show.  She did crack us (and the people around us) up before it started by loudly and repeatedly exclaiming, "Best. Day. EVER!"  

It was pretty fun...

Happy Birthday to me!

Yesterday was my birthday. It was a good day. I got up early, went to the gym, went to the grocery store, went to an eye doctor appointment, came home, and cleaned the bathroom. As I was scrubbing the bathtub I thought, "Yup. I'm a grown-up." Then I hurried to make a pesto potato salad for the baby shower that I was hosting.

That night Brian and I went out to dinner, which was a special treat since I've been doing this new diet.  (I was so excited that one of my off days fell on my birthday!)  He was playing around with his new phone and snapped a picture of me.  Later I was comparing it to the one he took of me when we went out for our anniversary one month ago.  I don't know that you can tell from these pictures very much, since they are really just my face and different angles, but I have lost almost 8 lbs. and several inches! That was probably the thing that made me the happiest for my birthday. Brian also gave me a great card and a gift card to go get some new clothes, since mine are getting pretty baggy. Hopefully in another two weeks it will be a necessity!

After dinner we fought the snow up the hill to my in-laws to pick up our kids. I was ready to go home and get to bed, but Jake reminded me that I had promised him he could rent a video game for helping me clean the house and get ready for the baby shower. So we right instead of left and headed off to Blockbuster. Evie excitedly decided that she was going to look for a Telly Tubbies video.  Brian quickly  said, "No. We are not having Telly Tubbies in our house!" Jake, sounding very puzzled, asked, "Why Dad? They'll teach her German.... then she'll be bilingual!"  I know having that kid around helps me burn extra calories from laughing every day!

If you go out in the woods today...

You'd better not go alone!

Today's the day the teddy bears have their picnic.

Today we had a party to meet my cousin Janessa's baby girl, Ellie. We decided it would be fun to have the baby shower that we didn't get to have (because of distance and timing) before she was born.  

The banner says "Welcome to the picnic"

We borrowed some small pine trees and for the rest of the decorations I raided my kids' doll box and play kitchen.

It was killing Lila that I had brought all this fun upstairs (where I don't usually allow toys) and I wouldn't let her play with it! I know. I am such a mean mom...

The little bears in the trees were sent out with the invitations and everybody dressed them up and brought them back so Tiffany can use them to make a mobile.  I was going to do a "Fairy Bear" but then I decided to knit a tiny sweater instead. (You can kind of see it in the first picnic picture...) And it was a good thing, because there were lots of fairy bears. But they were all so cute. 

Tiffany had a game for Janessa, where she had to taste some jars of baby food and guess what they were. She got 3 out of 5 right, but I was more impressed that she was such a good sport and even tried it! I really don't think I would have...

Especially after seeing Janessa's reaction.

Here is the guest of honor Ellie. She spent most of the party playing with the tissue paper.

This is the only other picture I got of her. Doesn't this picture just say, "Who are you and why are you photographing me?"  She is a darling baby though, good work Nessa!

Now for some random crowd shots to document who was there...

Tiffany, Kaia, Janessa, and Kamra (the proud Grandma!)

Jen and Vivianne, Donna, Cecily (who's turn it will be next), the Great-One, Kristen

Grandma, Kristen, Lauren, Amy, Kaylee, Lizzy, Evie, and Lila

(Tiffany will most likely kill me for posting this, but I did give her fair warning...)

This picture just kills me! I was trying to get this group and Tiffany noticed and tried to slink back out of the shot.  Obviously she didn't quite make it...

A redo so you can see what she looks like when she is being normal. I can't help feeling like the smile is  trying to lure me in to a false sense of security, when she's really thinking, "You have to sleep sometime..."

Kissing Cousins! 

Lila and Kaia kept giving each other hugs and kisses all day. It was so sweet.

It was a fun day ladies, thanks for coming!

How embarrassing...

What's wrong Lila?

Oh dear, something is eating your nightgown...

Don't worry, Daddy will save you.

Poor thing, she was quite distressed. 

What's in a name?

Today the girls were playing together and pretending that Lila was Evie's puppy dog. Evie took her for a "walk" around the house on the end of one of my measuring tapes.  It was so cute, until Lila made wrong turn and Evie called out to her to heel. "Pissty! Stop it! Come here Pissty! Come here!"

"What did you just call your sister?"

"She's not my sister, she's my puppy and I named her Pissty. Isn't it so cute?"

Uh- what do you say to that one?

Add another reason to why we won't be getting pets anytime soon. And we won't let Evie name them if we ever do get one...

Attitude with a capital A!

Earlier today I told Lila to go get a new diaper out of her closet and bring it to me so I could change her.  Five minutes later she comes down the hall and pauses in the kitchen door way, and she was NOT carrying a diaper. I asked her, "Lila, did you bring me a diaper?"  She cocked her head to one side, tapped her cheek with her finger and said, "Hmmm, let me think...."  all the while giving me a look that clearly said 'You foolish woman... do you see a diaper in my hand?'  Obviously rhetorical questions will not work with this child.

At least she doesn't reserve all her sass for me. A couple of nights ago Brian and she met in the hallway and were both trying to go different directions.  Lila looked up at him and said, "Excuse me, lady!" as she pushed past his crutches.

And of course her brother and sister don't escape the attitude either. One day they were all playing in the girl's room and as they all tried to walk out the door together there was much bumping into each other and off the walls. I distinctly heard Lila say, "Hey watch it! I'm walking here!" sounding for all the world like a New York City pedestrian.  (She has since said it to me as we passed on the stairs.)

I don't want her to think that talking back and sassing people is acceptable, but lately it's been all I can do to not just burst out laughing. And she most definitely does not need the positive reinforcement...

It usually works better when they don't know what's coming... but whatever.

Tonight as I was making dinner I told the kids that it was time to clean up the toy room. Jake and Evie both came running up the stairs to complain. Jake said, "Well, I'll clean the toy room... and Evie will probably help a little... but Lila won't."  Evie quickly followed up with, "Yeah! Lila just follows around and makes more mess by playing with everything we're trying to pick up!" I sighed, and said, "I know you guys. What you need to do is put on a movie that she likes so she'll be distracted and you can clean up."  They both ran back down the stairs and at about halfway down I hear Evie yell, "Hey Lila! We are going to distract you now!"

Happy Valentine's/Birthday Brian!

I got home from the gym this morning and hurried to make a special Valentine's Day breakfast for the people I love the most!

I remember as a child that on Valentine's Day my mom would always have a little gift for us to open at breakfast. I wanted to keep that tradition in my family. So each child got a book and a little box of chocolates. Because it just isn't Valentine's Day without chocolates... (None for me today though.)

The birthday boy with his birthday socks! (Doesn't he look so happy that I got him up a little early to start celebrating?) We also got him a new shirt, and a few of his favorite treats.  Pretty exciting for turning 39!

Jake's book was a thumb wrestling how to manual. He was so excited when he opened it! He had been drooling over it at the school book fair, but I have a hard and fast rule that we only buy a book to read at the book fair. He was totally surprised that I had gotten it for him... and promptly proceeded to draw a Lucha Libre style wrestling mask on his thumb.

For my fancy little princess who loves to play "blu-ty parlor", a Fancy Nancy book about playing beauty parlor. 

Lila was much more interested in opening her "cock-lats", but once she took the time to check it out she also was happy with her picture book. It is the words to You are my Sunshine, which is a special song in our family.

I wasn't left out of the present giving.  Jacob made me this beautiful necklace, which I proudly wore out in public when we went to see the new movie Gnomeo and Juliet after dinner.

And Brian continued his sweet tradition of bring flowers for all of us girls. Evie and Lila love their flowers and would sleep with them if we would let them. 

It was a long, busy, but fun day for us. Full of love and being together, just like it should be.

A bit of random fashion...

Lately Evie's been on a big "I want to pick out my own outfit" kick. 

I personally love the combinations she comes up with. Stripes, plaids, dots, flowers. Some days there is an overall theme or color (yesterday was pink). Sometimes there's not. 

Lila is still happy enough to let me dress her most days. I am having almost daily fits of nostalgia as most of her clothes are hand-me-downs from Evie.

Today Evie insisted on wearing her white and red dress because tomorrow is Valentine's day. Lila finally grew into the dress I made her last year.

Evie also wanted me to do her hair like Belle.
I did my best. 

She was happy, so I call it good.

(She also told me three different times today that she wants to be Belle for Halloween this year. I finally told her not to tell me again until October.)

These pictures crack me up. Usually at least one of them looks at the camera, but not this time.

My sweethearts!

F.P.M.N.

That's code around here for Family Popcorn Movie Night. It's one of our kids' favorite things to do. And with the new Netflix account I've been excited to share some old favorites with them. Tonight's selection was Cheaper by the Dozen. The classic, not the cheesy re-make with Steve Martin. I love old movies, especially the ones made in the 50's. It's so nice to sit down and watch a show with my children that has no profanity, no violence, and no inappropriate sex-scenes.

I remember watching this movie several times as a child, and really enjoying it.  I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly my children became engrossed with the story and characters.  Maybe a little to much though... 

I didn't remember that at the end of this version the father, who has scoffed at the family doctor's advice through the whole movie, dies because of a heart problem.  They don't show him dying or in pain, but there is a heart-rending scene where the eight year old son tells his older sister, "Oh Ann, our daddy is dead!"  I cried.  Poor Jacob fell completely apart. Brian came into to find out why Jacob was sobbing hysterically, I told him and then said, "Remind me NEVER to show him Where the Red Fern Grows."

I feel like such a grown-up...

We finally got the cabinet for our new television.  I am really pleased with how it looks. (Plus we got a great deal on it, which makes it that much nicer every time I look at it.)  When we started the whole process of replacing the television, I told Brian I would leave it up to him to decide what electronics  we purchased, but it was really important to me that we get a nice cabinet to house it all. I didn't want something that looked cheap or just to make do. I didn't want something that looked like it could have come from our school/early married life.  If it is going to be one of the first things you see when you walk in my house, I wanted it to look like a piece of furniture that belonged in the living room.  

Mission accomplished.

The girls think it doubles as a neat playhouse...

"Hello Evie!"   "Hello Lila!"

I like being in the stage of life where we don't have to take "how big a pain would it be to move" into consideration when purchasing furniture...

While we were sleeping...

Last night, sometime after 1 am, when we tucked her into bed for what we thought was the final time and this morning at 6 am when I got up and staggered out the door, Evie did this...

If you just said, "Huh?" you echoed my sentiments exactly.

I don't know when she got out of bed and decided to layout everything she would need for the day, but she did. And without waking anyone else up. I don't know whether to be impressed or terrified.

She has her clothes, neatly folded, her slippers, all the things we use to do her hair, water spritzer, elastic box, hairbrush, comb, hairspray.  She even got out the q-tips so I could clean out her ears.  I especially love how she has lined up the doll and teddy bears, ready to start playing as soon as she gets up.  

If I'm lucky tonight she'll organize the junk drawer while I'm asleep...