Last Night

I must have had a memory lapse last night. See, I have been feeling bad lately about lack of ambition for dinner-making. I love to cook and was in a real kick of trying new recipes for quite a while. But ever since Madi was born, I have been quite lame. So last night, (with my memory momentarily gone) I said, no more of this! And I decided to make spaghetti and meatballs. I've never made meatballs before, and this was sauce from scratch, not from a jar. Oh, and breadsticks, my favorite part. However, as soon as the dough was supposed to be done rising, I discover Madi's blow-out! (She's not usually a blow out type of girl, and I assume it's because of her antibiotic since it's a daily occurrence lately). So I obviously have to take a while to clean that up. Later, just as I get my hands good and covered in raw meat, eggs, cheese and seasonings, Brynlee yells "potty!" and runs to the bathroom. Only she couldn't quite get those darn panies off in time... So I wash my hands off, clean her up, and start a load of laundry with all the poop stuff from Madi, and the pee stuff from Bryn. Wash my hands again, and resume making meatballs. Then, as I'm trying to get the sauce made, I'm also bouncing Madi around on my hip and singing to her to try to get her to stop screaming. All of the sudden those jars of Ragu I passed at the grocery store were lookin pretty good. So anyway, distracting Madison meant that my mind wasn't really on the food. I halved the recipe, up until the seasonings, which got the full dose! That sauce did not lack flavor I'll tell you what! I then stopped again to feed Madi. The breadsticks burned/stuck to the pan like cement glue (only on the bottom though, the top 3/4 were really good). Not to mention, this whole time Tyler and Brynlee have completely trashed the house and emptied my cupboards to play hide and seek in there with glow sticks. To top it all off, Kenny didn't even get home until about 7:00, so he missed dinner. (Although he did have nothing but high praise for it when he got home, that made me feel a little better!) Now I remember why I don't do dinners like this very often. Thank goodness there's enough for left-overs tonight! :) I think they should do a reality tv show with moms cooking dinner for their families. All those fake reality tv shows they have with a time limit or whatever, that's nothin. The real challenge, is doing it in your own home, with a bunch of needy children! Also last night, our power went out. It was pretty random. Luckily, it was really good timing, and ended up being fun instead of scary. We had put the kids to bed already (except the baby of course), it was about 8:30 p.m. Glad we had cell phones to find the candles and light them. We had all sorts of scents going on--cinnamon vanilla, apple cinnamon, pumpkin spice, etc. it was weird, and romantic! :) We couldn't do anything else but sit there and talk to each other in our dimly-lit house. We put extra blankets on the kids in case it didn't come back on during the night and even went to bed early. We should make the power go out at night more often. No distractions. At 12:51 a.m. it came back on and I got up to turn off the lights that spontaneously came on. I am grateful we normally have power to wash clothes, dishes, computer, lights, etc. I always forget how very dependent I am on it.

Honesty is (usually) the best policy

We love pizza around here. Ever since I got my new pizza stone a couple months ago, we've been having homemade pizza every Thursday night. I do one cheese pizza for the kids, and try something new for me and Kenny. Last night I did chicken alfredo. We also like veggie, hawaiian, supreme, BBQ chicken, and whatever we can throw together. But the whole cheese pizza thing for the kids week after week sounds not so healthy. But let me tell you my tricks... I use freshly ground whole wheat flour for the dough. Also, the sauce is made from sauteed spinach and crushed tomatoes. And they eat it! Well, mostly. I occassionally catch them pulling out a piece of spinach out of their mouths and saying "eww, yucky!" But I've convinced them that it's just the "sauce" so they keep going. Tyler is on to me though. He says, are these vegetables? And I have to lie through my teeth--no, it's just cheese pizza. I know, I'm so sneaky. But if you knew how little of vegetables this kid really eats, you'd be cheering on my deception tactics.

And just for fun, here's a picture of Brynlee perched precariously on the kichen sink, so she can reach the tap. She likes to repeatedly wash her hands and play with the dishes in the sink. I did get her a taller chair after snapping this picture to avoid an accident, but then she completely soaked herself and we had to change her clothes. So I don't know which way is better.

And look at my little Madi Lynn propping herself up on her elbows! She can halfway roll over haha. She gets her top half, she just can't swing her big legs over. I finally took her into the doctor on Wed. to see why her cold won't go away and she had an ear infection. So hopefully this antibiotic will get rid of it for good.

Wish List

As we get closer every day to moving, I can't help but dream about our next home and some of the things I would like. We have definitely outgrown this little house and I have been making up a mental wish list--much to Kenny's dismay ;).

--At least 3 bedrooms, but while I'm dreaming big let's just say 4 or 5. I'd love to have a place for family to sleep besides an air mattress in the living room! I could really use a craft room to keep my sewing machine and other such things away from little fingers.
-A pantry!
-A fence around the backyard to keep the kids in, and creeps out. Plus, Kenny and the children really want a dog, and I will not cave until we have a fence so that dog can stay outside.
-Walk-in closet. Or at least a closet that's bigger than 4ft. x 2 ft. Seriously--our closets are teensy.
-2 bathrooms! Like a master bath, and then one for the kids to use.

I guess I'll wait and see what we can get. A girl can dream, right?

Bryn's Latest

So Brynlee's latest acts of diva queen consist of her getting upset, running to her room and slamming the door shut!! WHERE does she learn these things? Seriously. I thought that came with a teenager--not a 2 year old.

She also likes to try to blame Tyler for everything. He was sitting on the counter helping me make bread, when Bryn comes over crying (because she fell down or something) and says, "Tywer hurt me". It ticked Tyler off (...NO I didn't Bryn! I'm sitting all the way over here!), so now she does it all the time. Anytime she gets hurt she tries to tell me Tyler did it. Sneaky little thang. She has proven quite the match for Ty and his teasing. She's quickly learned ways to dish it back.

It cracks me up how she tells me "good job Mom" for any little thing I do. I guess I say that phrase more than I realize, when she always says it back to me. WHen I put her shoes on, "good job Mom, good job" haha.

My favorite, is that every time she runs into a room she yells, "Surprise!" No matter how long it's been since you last made eye contact with her, it is a "surprise" every time :).

And on a totally different note, here's a cute picture of my baby girl. I am so obsessed with her cheeks and her smile. I try to eat her up all the time, just ask Kenny.


p.s. Why didn't I have one of these bouncy play things with my first two kids? This thing is a life-saver!! I love it, and so does she!

Way too much

I have way too much to catch up on, and although I shouldn't, I'm going to do one looooong post. So here goes!

Last Saturday, March 12th I went to a fun fashion show/brunch thing that Lisa invited me and several other gals to. It was fun to get out for a few hours and look at cute clothes and jewelry. Later that afternoon my parents, my brother Tim, and my sister Sarah came up to our house!! It was their spring break so they took advantage of the break and came up here to go to Nauvoo. That night we went over to Lisa's (she's moving to Katy so she and my mom had fun getting to know each other and talked about houses/areas, etc.) we ate Papa Murphy's pizza and watched the BYU game!! Pretty dissapoing that time though.

Sunday morning my family left early, and took Tyler with them to Nauvoo! I stayed home with the girls from church because they both had fevers during the night and colds. This picture is from that evening when they were both still feeling miserable, and somewhat dramatic. Poor things. Kenny said that he is putting a request in for boys :)

Monday: Not much happened. I spent the entire day taking care of sickies, and cleaning, to get ready to show the house that night. Our landlord is trying to find a replacement renter for when we leave at the end of April so I had to get it looking presentable. Oh, and it was totally snowing all morning.

Tuesday: I missed my presidency meeting, and the kids missed their gymnastics, and we just were taking it easy because they were still not doing great. No fevers anymore, just still yucky colds. I hate when babies are sick. This is my sweet Madison zonked out on the couch. She is such a sweetheart. She loves to have her hands up by her face, and she's usually sucking on her thumb instead of the pacifier.

My family also got back Tuesday night. I really missed Tyler! I'm so pathetic, I hate being away from my kids. It was fun to see them again and spend time with them.

Wednesday: my family left at 6 a.m. and I really can't remember if anything happened that day. Kenny went to Young Mens that night as usual, that's about it I think.
Thursday: St. Patrick's Day! I normally hate this holiday and I don't understand why our whole nation celebrates it when we're not all Irish. I think it's pretty silly so I've never done anything for it. Even when I was little, if I did remember to wear green it was only to avoid being pinched by stupid kids. But this year I was eating my words as I was in charge of the playgroup we do once a month. I decided since it was on St. Patty's day I better put it around that. So we had a couple crafts for it and I made some rainbow jello. It really didn't go all that great becuase not many people showed up, and it was ridiculously windy so it was really hard for little kids to do crafts. We were all chasing a lot of papers around the park. But in the end, it was just fun to get out and play with other kids on the playground. I was just bummed that I wasted money and time on it, but that's okay.
It also got over 70 wonderful degrees that day so we really loved playing outside and opening all our windows. Brynlee's getting the hang of riding a tricycle, and it's pretty cute to watch her learn.

And we watched the BYU game online that night. Go Cougs!! My whole family is having a friendly competition with the brackets--I'm not doing too bad surprisingly enough!

Friday: I decided to be brave and take the kids out to Chesterfield, Missouri (an hour away) to the butterfly house. March is supposedly the best month to go and we had a fun time! It was really neat to see all the beautiful butterflies. I laughed a lot as my kids were dodging them like they were some deadly, frightening creatures. There were hundreds of butterflies and it was really cool.

They had a cool case of tons of Chrysalis' in all different stages. They get new shipments of butterflies in every day since they only live for a few weeks. It was pretty cool to see, and Tyler loved it!

After the butterfly house we decided to hit the fun mall that was right there by it. We shopped around and got lunch, and didn't go home until they were all exhausted. All in all it was a success, and I'm glad we went. I had to hurry home and clean again because we had to show the house again that night. And I got to make lots of crepes for the next morning. After the kids went to bed, Kenny and I watched the movie "Life as we know it" and I teared up several times. Cute show.

Saturday: Tyler had his first soccer game!!! It was really cold and windy, but I think it was an awesome first time. He's on the same team as 2 friends from church, Ashlynn Porter and Liam McLean. Ann McLean is their coach and so it's lots of fun to go there. We lost 3-2, but they don't really keep score anyway :). Ty's sad that he didn't score a goal, but we told him maybe next time. It's pretty cute to watch this swarm of kids chase a ball around. Only a few really know what to do, so it's hilarious. He feels so cool wearing shin guards and soccer shorts, he is really excited about the whole thing.

This is my favorite: his defensive stance. I'd definitely be intimidated if I was on the other team!

From there, Kenny dropped me off at the church for a Relief Society birthday brunch. It was lots of fun, and really well-done. (That's what the crepes were for.) It was all about purses, and the diff. bags we carry throughout our lives. Super cute, and fun to be there. The rest of the day has been Saturday stuff. Washing and vacuuming out cars, running, house cleaning, and now Kenny's at a Stake dance shakin his bootie. Just kidding, he saves all his best dance moves for me haha :)

It's been a long, good week. If only we could get our little girls healthy again, I'd be thrilled!

Quote

'The true end of life is not mere existence. The true purpose of life is the perfection of humanity through individual effort, under the guidance of God's inspiration. Real life is response to the best within us. To be alive only to appetite, pleasure, pride, money-making, and not to goodness and kindness, purity and love, poetry, music, flowers, stars, God and eternal hopes is to deprive one's self of the real joy of living."

-David O. McKay

Chub-a-licious

Some of my favorite things about my sweet 3-month old:

How she sucks her thumb

Our daily/nightly chats--she's very conversational with me

She's happiest when she's naked, or when she's having her diaper/clothes changed. Whenever she's fussy, I just lay her down and act like I'm changing her diaper or her outfit and she just starts laughing and smiling!

Her soft baby skin

Big, beautiful eyes

She has lots of dark hair

Love this little naker bum

She put her boots on and said, "ready to go!"

That's my girl!

Just stuff

Last Thursday Madison laughed for the first time! Before she would do like a one-chuckle thing, but this was a real laugh!! I had her in just her diaper, about to give her a bath and I was tickling her and she laughed!! I love love love it. She turned 3 months old on the 5th, so last Saturday. I can't believe she's already that old, but at the same time I think it's weird that she's not older. I know that doesn't make sense. She's super big though. We tried to weigh her at home on our scale and she's over 16 pounds! She's such a joy to have around. Seriously she makes everyone happier. My mom said the other day how your first two kids you usually get are hot and cold, and the third one is just right. That's certainly true for us. And by the way, let me just mention that I am also the third child :)

I have been thinking lately how babies just come as they are. No matter what you try to do as parents, pretty much their personalities and natures are going to stay the same. You just try to work with what you've got. They are who they are from day 1--actually from before since their spirits were existing, but let's not get too technical. Like Brynlee, for example, was a really hard baby. She cried a lot. I realize now that I have another baby, how traumatized I was from her. haha, I know that sounds awful. But still, to this day, she is my hardest. 90% of the time, it is Brynlee having a melt down in public, or running away, or mouthing off to me, or hitting, or waking up at weird times, etc. I will also add that she changes pretty fast, and can be as sweet as sweet can be the next minute, full of loves for everyone! But anyway, I was just thinking how cool it is that we are all unique, and to not fret so much as parents about the way our children act, (to an extent; I'm not saying they shouldn't still be taught and disciplined) because they are pre-wired that way.

Tyler asks me the neatest questions. They come totally out of the blue, too.

How do our bodies float up to God?

How do trees stay standing up?

Which bear is the biggest?

How do babies get here? Like when you're a mom and a dad, how do you just get a baby?

Why do people do bad things?

Why does that girl have 2 dads?

And on and on and on. Leads to a lot of discussions about the resurrection, root systems, homosexuality, etc. that I never thought I'd be having with a 4-year old. All on his level, of course. But I am continually amazed at how high his "level" really is.

This past weekend we had Stake Conference. Saturday was fun becuase Kenny and Jared went up early for another session with a bunch of men and Terra, Charlene Kraude, and I came later. We got a babysitter, Cassie, for the evening and the kids had fun with her (though I had Madi with me). We loved going out to eat with our husbands at Qdoba before the adult session. It was like a triple date and we had a great time. On Sunday they broadcasted it from Salt Lake so we got to have it at just our church, instead of driving 45 minutes again to the stake center. It was a great weekend. This is getting really long.

Friday Evening Storm

I was tired tonight. Madi was up for about an hour during the night, Bryn woke up twice, and Kenny was up off and on the entire night coughing and what not (until around 3 a.m. when he finally went on the couch). Have I mentioned he's sick again? He came home from work with a fever the same day I was finishing my antibiotic. I said "oh heck no", and have made sure he stays far away from all of us. But anyway, after a long day today, I was worn out. I climbed into my sweats a little early, and was wondering what am I going to do to entertain these kids, on this Friday night, with very little energy? Thankfully, a storm blew in. We turned all the lights off, and pulled up the blinds. I sat on the rocking chair to feed Madison, and Kenny got some chairs for Ty and Bryn to watch it too. I was sitting directly behind them, and it reminded me of the little boy and girl in The Cat in the Hat so I made Kenny take a picture of them. :) And yes, Brynlee's wearing a princess dress over her clothes. Ty is sporting his spiderman costume with a pirate hat, and he had a sword. It was a memorable moment though. We opened the windows to hear the thunder rolling, the frogs croaking, the wind and rain, and even a train in the distance. Thanks to the street lamp we could watch the rain hit the street, as the puddles got wider and deeper. The lightning was so bright! We could feel the cool breeze flowing in, and smell the clean rain scent. Tyler had his head pressed up to the screen and said, "It's a beautiful night!" :) And it was. It was just what we needed to help pass the time, peacefully. Before we knew it, it was time to get ready for bed. Thank you storm, you're welcome here anytime.

Update

So I have somehow managed to steal a few minutes to myself because all 3 kids are napping at the same time! That never happens, because Tyler doens't nap anymore, and it's rare enough that I get both girls asleep together. But Ty peed the bed last night (shouldn't have given him a drink) so he woke up super early because of it, and we played outside today which we don't normally do...so anyway he was tired and I insisted.

Life is good around here. I'm trying to remain patient as we anxiously await to hear our fate of where we will be living come May. That's the crazy thing about Kenny's job is you just never know till last minute (sometimes literally) and it's hard for me, a huge planner-preparedness person, to not be able to plan our lives for even 3 months in advance. But I do have faith that we will end up wherever the Lord wants us to be, and that we can choose to be happy wherever we live. There's a few different places being tossed around as options, we just have to wait and see.

Ty and Bryn are taking a gymnastics class at the YMCA, one right after the other, on Tuesdays and they're loving that. It's a fun outlet, and I wish I would've known all along that you could take classes at the Y, even if you weren't a member. I've wasted a lot of money at The Little Gym, but oh well.

We still do preschool with Tyler every day and I'm trying to teach him how to read, so we do a little lesson or two every day for that as well. Brynlee, on the other hand, still needs to learn her colors. She says everything is green, even when I think she knows the right answer. She's also started asking to go potty the past few days. Although she hasn't actually gone in the toilet, I do let her sit on it whenever she asks, and that's about it.

I love having a treadmill, and my days go the best when I can get my fat butt out of bed in the morning to run before the kids get up. Still have a good 10 pounds to lose. I'm grateful that my health is back and allows me to work out, it makes me feel so much better, and be so much more productive. I think I'm starting to get the hang of 3 kids. It's proven to be a much bigger number than 2 most days. I remember when I only had to do laundry once a week...those were the good ol' days hahah. Just kidding, I am loving my life right now.

Madison is an excellent sleeper, probably because she's a formula fed baby. For reasons which I will not discuss on this blog, I only nursed her for 5 weeks, and anyway we do bottles now. She's the most perfect baby and I'm wondering how much of it is her personality, and how much of it is that she's bottle fed. But in any case, it sure is nice. She's also started sucking her thumb this past week, and it is the cutest thing ever. I know most parents don't like that at all, but she can put herself back to sleep without me having to get up and give her a pacifier. And she doesn't do it very often, so I'm letting it go.

The sun was shining today and even though it was still only 40 degrees outside, we went on a nice walk and the kids rode bikes on the driveway for a while. We can't wait for Spring!!!!