Girls and Horses

I’ve been terrible about blogging lately, so I told myself I could muster a post with at least one picture. That quickly turned into six.

Studio Grandma bought a miniature horse. This post doesn’t contain any pictures of her horse, but hopefully I’ll get to that. At the stables where Grandma’s horse is kept, they have a barn with a pasture full of mamas and babies. We got permission to go in and visit them, and the girls fell in love. This little horse took right to Phaedra and followed her around with such sweet loyalty. Of course, there was much talk directed at Daddy of “Pleeeeeeeeeease can we buy this horse for me?”

Eleanor made friends with the mama.

Life just doesn’t slow down. The kids are growing up so fast. I keep wanting to blog about Curtis and all his many milestones, but I’m so behind I don’t even know where to begin. Over the past month, he has added so many words to his vocabulary. When he first started trying to talk, he said a few easy words, such as “Mommy” and he was fairly good at saying “turn.” Then he learned the word “go,” and he started using it for everything. Go is a very useful word. He could be found to exclaim, “Go, go, go!” And one time, after my mom babysat him, I came home and asked him about the time they had. His response was a long, drawn out, “Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo,” having his voice go up and down as if he was having a long conversation with me.

Curtis is a doer. He sees something that needs to get done, and he does it. He loves to help me unload the dishwasher. If I start unloading while he is in his chair, eating, he will demand to get out at once so he won’t miss out on helping me.

I feel like I’m finally coming up for air. Grant went away to Florida for a week at the end of April, and then he was off to class for the weekend the very next week. Among all that, we’ve had Mothers’ Day and our Anniversary and even a major job interview for Grant (we’re still in suspense—grrr).

I’m still trying to get around to some spring cleaning and organization, although it baffles me every year how anyone can manage spring cleaning when I can’t even keep up with the day-to-day.

My calling had a slight change as I’m no longer team teaching my little class of 4-5 year olds. I’m now teaching it all by myself. The main challenge in this is that my sweet little boy does NOT want to go to nursery—not without me, at least. I’ve been up in the night stressing over that one, but so far, my only solution is to ignore everyone else, do things my way, and give him the time he needs to get used to things.

There are so many things I want to do better, so many areas in which I want to improve. I can at least say that I’ve been fairly consistent at working out or going running with friends besides when I have been sick (we’ve had several bouts of sickness this spring in our house). It’s SO nice to have running buddies who consistently motivate me to get out of the house and just do it! I just wish the working out would actually show in my appearance. I’m getting a complex because people at church keep asking me if I’m pregnant. Granted, this time, it was a 4 year old, but it still doesn’t make me feel too good about my body image. The rest of my body isn’t so bad, but I just seem to carry anything extra in my gut. I guess I can’t blame people for making the mistake. I know I need to give up some of my late night munching, but that part is so hard.

Ah, well. Sometimes all I can do is scratch the surface when it comes to all the things I want to accomplish.

Time to Myself

The kids are in bed, hopefully asleep by now. I finally have some time to myself. I keep running through my head all the things I could and should do with this time.

I already unloaded and loaded the dishwasher as soon as the kids were in bed, so I’ve done one responsible thing. I usually at least unload during the day, but I avoided it today because Curtis loves to help me so much that he wouldn’t understand if I tried to prevent him from helping because he is sick.

I’m blogging right now, so I consider that an accomplishment .

Other things I’d like to do:

• write in my journal
• read my scriptures
• read my book (I just started reading Pandemonium. I’m putting off the book club book a little longer because I want it fresh in my memory when I go to book club.)
• I probably ought to wash a load of laundry, but I doubt that will happen tonight.
• just sit and watch some TV with some good munchies
• work on my crazy quilt (But I don’t think I’ll do that because I can’t stand the thought of possibly waking the kids. I’m proud to say that I have it started, though. I always wanted to make a crazy quilt of all the flannel scraps from all the receiving blankets I’ve made for people. I really have no quilting skills and no idea what I’m doing, but I just jumped in and got started.)

Then, there are the things I could be doing right now that I always tell myself I’ll get around to doing:

• work on editing my blog book (This is the same blog book of my blog posts from 2007 that I’ve been working on since probably 2009. I had it all finished as far as layout and editing, but then I got Photoshop and I told myself that if I could improve the photos, I might as well try. It will probably never be done.)
• archive my photos
• figure out what activities I want to print for the kids for general conference so I’m not trying to figure it out and print it DURING conference.
• try to increase my knitting skills
• Clean my room! I have found that I can’t clean my room because Curtis always has to be with me, and he only takes 2 seconds to get into something he shouldn’t be into when he’s in my room. It just gets worse and worse. No wonder the kids don’t care if their room is a mess.
• ah well, the list goes on and on. I couldn’t get a fraction of the things I’ve already written done, so why go on?

Here are some day-in-the-life type photos I took today at lunch. I never get pictures of Eleanor anymore because she’s at school (and when she’s home, odds are, her nose is in a book)!

This boy only took a little time to learn how to eat an orange slice. He LOVES oranges.

Curtis is sick. I thought he was just dealing with his leftover cough from when Eleanor gave it to Phae who gave it to him, but today made it pretty clear that this is a whole new cough. It figures, since he went to his first day of nursery on Sunday (if it counts as “going” if a parent has to be in the room with him the whole time). I’m sure we’ll be in this pattern for a while: go to church, sick by Wed/Thurs, miss a week, repeat. He was miserable today, with explode-a-nose every time he sneezed and his nose running all the rest of the time. He kept me up until 3am last night. He’s coughing now. I only hope we don’t have another night like last night.

Phaedra was actually a little better for me today. She didn’t get into any major mischief or tantrums, and that’s saying a lot for what I’ve had to deal with from her lately.

This is how Curtis looks when I play footsie with him under his high chair tray. He is so ticklish, and he loves to play and tease. He especially likes to wrestle. His favorite thing lately is to come charging at me while I’m sitting on the floor and knock me over.Here’s that pesky tree I mentioned in my last post. This is a terrible, taken from inside picture because it was raining today. You can’t see where I sawed off the branch. It was at the back of the tree, and about as thick as my arm. You can see there are very few sections of pink blossoms left. It’s mostly taken over by the white blossoms. But I feel like I have to try.

And finally, look who was feeling optimistic when she filled out her chore chart tonight (without my supervision). Hmm, I think I’ll have to break out the eraser tomorrow morning.

Well, now I’ve used up most of my time to myself if I want to get to bed at a reasonable hour. I think I’ve narrowed my options down to reading a little or watching a little TV before I shuffle off to bed and pray the kids stay asleep all night. But now Curtis is coughing again. This doesn’t look very promising.

Eleanor was trying to tell me before bed that she had a sore throat, and would she be allowed a water bottle in her bed if she started coughing a lot in the night? I told her she wasn’t allowed to even entertain the idea of getting sick. I never know if she’s being her usual, hypochondriac self or if she’s actually getting sick. My mom was going to come hang out with us tomorrow night, and I don’t want sick kids to ruin it!

Snap Out of It

Today I was stuck in a rut.

Well, I guess you could say it was a buildup of a rut that got progressively worse through the weekend. I’m sure a large part of it was due to the fact that we had to leave the coast and come back to civilization where Grant could go back to work on Monday. And I have Black Thursday (as I like to call it) looming ahead of me this week. And someone thought—by the looks of my body—that I was pregnant yesterday. I’m NOT pregnant.

This past month has been rough. We have had challenges, big and small piled onto our little family. I don’t want to flesh out all that has happened. Some of it isn’t worth blogging and the rest doesn’t belong on a blog. I’ve handled it fairly well most of the time . . . some of the time. But I have certainly had my moments when I’ve needed to stress out, mope, or just cry.

As I was scrolling through Facebook last night, I was reading all the happy messages about Christ’s resurrection. I saw all the happy, smiling family photos with all the kids dressed up in their Easter clothes. I even saw some new announcements about pregnancies among my friends. People had so much joy and happiness to share.

I wanted to share something too. I have a strong testimony of Christ, and I know it is a joyful thing that he died so we too may live again. I wanted to be happy for all of my happy friends. I wanted to share a lovely, smiling picture of my own kids dressed up in Easter clothes. But I couldn’t find it in me. I searched within myself, and even though I knew I had joy, I could not bring it to the surface. I was envious of some of my happy friends. I was sad and downtrodden. When I thought about the pictures I took of my kids, I thought about how difficult it was just to get them to cooperate long enough for me to get just one picture with them all looking at me—forget smiling. I didn’t feel like I could say anything positive, so I didn’t say anything at all.

I prayed fervently last night that I could find a way to focus on the positive and quit moping. I prayed for help in changing my attitude, because I knew the biggest part of the problem was how I was looking at things.

This morning showed no improvement. Grant got up to go to work, and the girls were at each other’s throats much of the morning. Grant had to work late tonight, so I knew we were in for a long day. I lost my temper with the kids, and that always brings down my mood when I lose control.

I kept trying, struggling within myself to find some way to look at things positively, to find something I could count as a blessing. But I was in such a rut, I could even turn a positive thought into something negative.

I would tell myself that at least Curtis didn’t scream through my shower while I had him confined to the exersaucer. But then Eleanor kept coming in and pestering me for this or that—things I was not capable of helping her with while I was in the shower, and I ended up yelling at her to leave me alone.

I told myself that at least Eleanor didn’t flip out when I caught Phaedra sneaking one of her suckers while hiding under the covers of her bed. Never mind the fact that those covers were now totally sticky and I had to change her sheets.

There are other examples, but you get the picture. My positives turned negative, either of their own making or because of my own bad mood and negative thoughts.

Luckily, around lunch, the tide started to turn. The kids cleared their coloring off the table without too much of a fight. My friend came by while we were eating to drop off the book I need to read for book club that I thought I wouldn’t be able to get and read in time for the book club meeting. The book is super short! Definite positive! I resisted the urge to be totally embarrassed that we were eating lunch at 2 in the afternoon. Daylight savings has messed with Curtis’s nap, and Curtis’s nap has messed with when we eat lunch. I haven’t figured out a way to remedy that yet. But I told myself it didn’t matter; my sweet friend wasn’t going to judge.

After lunch, we went outside. It was cloudy and a little cool, but after a little while out there, I was ready to take off my jacket. I had finally remembered to borrow a saw from Grant’s dad, and I was excited to start hacking away at the tree in our backyard. The tree is meant to be a tree with droopy branches and pink blossoms, but it’s being invaded by a tree with branches that stick straight up with white blossoms. I’m no arborist, but I want to try to save my pink blossomed tree by slowly cutting away the large branches that produce white blossoms. The girls loved it every time I cut off a branch with white blossoms on it because they could pick all the flowers.

My brother, Mike, stopped by while we were outside to drop off some treats for the kids for Easter. I had felt a little anxious about him coming because of the mood I was in today and because things are sometimes awkward between us. I was wrong to feel apprehensive. We had a lovely little visit. He didn’t get too extravagant in what he gave the kids, and he and I had a good time talking for a while before he had to leave.

When I got done wrestling with that tree, my hands were calloused and sore and my arms felt like the jello, but I felt great. I was finally working on taking back my tree, the tree that I stare at every time I sit at my dining room table. After that, I felt like I should try to make some progress on my filthy house, but instead, Curtis and I started playing what I decided to call “the back door game.” It goes like this:

• Curtis climbs through the dog door on our back screen door into the house. Then he tries to put the cover over the dog door flap.
• I help him insert the cover, blocking the back door.
• He begs me to open the back door.
• I open the door for him, and he climbs down the steps, stands next to the porch, and pushes the door shut again.
• He comes to the dog door and acts frustrated to find it blocked.
• I poke my finger through the hole in the dog door cover each time he lifts the flap.
• He humors me and laughs a few times before getting frustrated that I’m not letting him in.
• I remove the dog door cover so he can enter the house through the dog door.
• Repeat.

During our game, my mom called, and I got to catch up with her while I continued playing with Curtis. I loved allowing myself that time to just enjoy him and enjoy talking to my mom.

Then I got the kids cleaned up from playing so they could all come back inside to watch Wild Kratts. Ah, Wild Kratts, I love you so. It was a time for all of us to relax, and I needed a break. I had two little snugglers next to me the whole time.

Just as I started cooking dinner, a neighbor dropped by. She’s a very sweet lady about my mother’s age, and she had brought an Easter basket to give to us. As I picked up Curtis and Phaedra ran out to say, “Did you bring something for me?” my neighbor looked at the kids with a grin and said, “You have such beautiful children. Your family is so blessed!” Then Phae ran out into the front yard and ignored me when I asked her to come back inside until my neighbor went and got her and brought her back to me.

This neighbor doesn’t see us very much except in passing. She doesn’t really know my kids. She didn’t know that Eleanor and Phaedra had been at each other’s throats this morning. She doesn’t know that Phaedra is sneaky and disobedient and most of the time I have no idea what to do with her. She doesn’t know how often I go into the bathroom and find that, once again, Phaedra didn’t bother to flush the toilet . . . or even wipe her bottom! She doesn’t know how Curtis screeches at the top of his lungs when he gets fed up asking me for something that I’m not giving to him.

But even though she doesn’t know all that . . . I knew—I KNEW she was right. My family is beautiful. And we are so, so blessed. And I knew the Lord had sent her to me at just the right time to help me see that obvious truth that was right in front of me that I was failing to see on my own. And even though this month has been rough, I have not lost faith. In fact, I think my faith has only grown. Because through all these challenges have been so many of these moments when I have felt my Heavenly Father’s love for me. Whether it was a thought or a mood I have felt just when I have needed to be strengthened, or a phone call or attention from a friend or family member at just the right time when I had no more strength of my own. I have felt such an outpouring of love through all of these challenges that I know I have never been alone. Things will work out. The pain will fade in time. And I have SO much to be grateful for.

I’m so glad I could snap out of it today so I could see that.

You Mean We Get to Go Outside?

Hooray! The sun has finally come around!

March in Oregon seems to be when we get our “spring teaser” as I like to call it. The sun comes out, the flowers bloom, and we all rush outside to enjoy the golden light after a long grey winter. Phaedra is my outside girl, and she has been in heaven. Right now, as I type this she is playing in the backyard. She has been talking to the crows. They caw, and I hear her give an answering, “ah ah ah.”

Last week was when we first got to spend some time out enjoying the sun, so I had to take a bunch of pictures. Curtis LOVED the chance to get outside and explore. I think his biggest problem was that his sisters still scolded him when he got near anything they were doing. He kept climbing up to the back door, but he didn’t want to go back inside.

Eleanor has come home from school for several weeks telling us about the fairy houses she and her friends make at school during recess. Usually, she sadly reports that the big kids ruined what they had started. I suggested they make their own fairy house in our yard where no one will ruin it (no mention of Curtis here). The girls worked together the first day on their fairy house, and didn’t end up with much to show for it. The next day that we went out, I helped make a start of a fairy house and gave some suggestions of what else they could do. The fairy house really took off from there, and they had a lot of fun making it.

The girls found a worm to be their friend, accidentally severed it, watched it die, and then made a “death bed” for it.

There’s nothing like finding a good stick to swing around and whack things. Don’t you love Phaedra’s clothing choice? I asked her to put on a jacket or change her shirt because she was wearing a light colored shirt that was a favorite. Always wanting to avoid a jacket, she changed into this shirt and kept the stripy pants.

The finished fairy house. It has two beds of moss with large leaves for blankets and small moss pillows.

Daddy came home!

Here are the girls with their fairy house. I actually got them to look at me, but I kind of like the crazy, not paying attention pictures better . . .

Another “finished” picture. This house had varying levels of completion. In fact, the girls just didn’t know when to quit. I don’t have a picture of it today, but it’s more of a jumble of leaves and branches. But the girls are still so proud of it, and that’s what matters.

Eleanor explains the food cups they left for the fairies, because fairies eat torn up leaves and flower petals, apparently.

My guys.

Curtis learned where his nose is. This is what he does when you ask him where it is.

Buggy

Eleanor’s school has been doing a fun week with a different theme every day. Monday was crazy hair day, and this is the hair Eleanor chose to go with. She wanted to look like a ladybug.

She wanted me to get a picture of her whipping her antennas around. This is how it turned out. Her face cracks me up.

Phaedra hates to be left out when I get out the camera. She’ll only let me get a shot of one of the other kids alone if I promise to get one with her after, so we got some sister pictures.

Not to leave out Curtis, the girls went over to where he was finishing up his very late after-nap lunch (daylight savings time messes everything up—understatement!). And yes, Curtis’s life is filled with the color pink. It’s everywhere. Don’t judge me.

I finally tried cutting his hair myself this time around. I was hoping to save some money. He watched me cut his daddy’s hair, and then Daddy held him while I cut his hair. He did really well. My skills certainly leave room for improvement, but it will have to do.

Here’s Eleanor before she left for school on crazy hair day. I forgot to have her take her jacket off, so I had to get more pictures after school with her ladybug shirt.

The next day was T-shirt day, where they wore their school shirts or a shirt with a lot of words on it. Wednesday was mismatch day, and this is what she wore.

Grant asked what kind of dress up day it was that morning before Eleanor had gotten dressed. When I told him it was mismatch day, he turned to Eleanor and said, “So I guess you’ll wear the same thing you usually wear?”

Eleanor scowled at him and protested. She thought he was telling her not to participate; she had no idea he was poking fun at her.

She very often does dress funny and in mismatched clothes. Sometimes I tell her she should change, but most days, I leave it be. I just love her confidence. She wears what she loves, and she doesn’t seem to care what other people think. I figure she has plenty of time later to worry about what matches and what doesn’t, what’s the latest fashion, and what might look funny on her. For now, she’s just a kid, and I want her to just enjoy being a kid. So I let her dress herself. And I hope when she shows up at school in some fashion atrocity that people see her as carefree.