2019 :: week 47

November 17

It was an unusual Sunday. We normally have church at 10:30am, but due to the other wards in our building having Stake Conference, our ward met at 1pm instead. The afternoon flew by! Anthony took the older kids to the church to watch the Face to Face with Elder Gong, but Miles had not napped all afternoon, so stayed back and fed him and put him and Elliott to bed a little early.

November 18

Monday ended up being super productive, despite a few set backs. I got up and got my machines working for me--I started a load of laundry and a load of dishes before I took the kids to school. I went to the gym for the first time in a long time. However, when I got back from the gym and went to move the clothes from the washing machine to the dryer I noticed that the washing machine had not drained all of the water. Instead of letting myself dwell on expensive worst case scenarios--which I often do--I got online and was able to figure out what was most likely causing the problem. Then I saw found how to manually drain the machine and did it! I was able to wash three more loads after this with no problem. After I got the laundry up and running again I finished putting the new trampoline mat on the frame. It felt good to be productive because after the kids get home from school my energy switches to them.

November 19

Tony was in San Diego for the week attending a conference for work. While he was gone I continued my daily "mental health walks." He doesn't travel nearly as much as he used to, for which I am grateful. Luckily the weather was nice enough that I could take Miles with me. He seems to enjoy watching the world pass by as we was walk around the neighborhood. He certainly fussed less than he did when we were at home and I was trying to make dinner.

November 20

We made a quick trip to the library Wednesday evening to pick up some books for Will. While Will and I searched for books Lauren and Elliott did a scavenger hunt and put on puppet shows for each other. Will's teacher (Mrs. Votava) has really lit a fire under him and his reading this year. All fourth graders are challenged to read forty books over the course of the school year, but are only allowed a few from each genre. Will has maxed out his "graphic novel," "historical fiction," "science fiction," "mysteries," "fantasies" and "biographies," so we were looking for a few books that would be considered "realistic fiction." We settled on A Long Walk to Water about kids growing up in Sudan.

November 21

After I pick up Elliott from preschool we meet the big kids at the park. Even though we live extremely close to the park I usually drive straight there. When it is time to go the kids like to wait on the bench and have me pick them up in the van. They call the bench the "bus stop."

November 22

Friday morning Elliott's friend Kendall came over for a few hours so her mom could go to the doctor and pick up a prescription. Stephanie has been coughing for awhile and then ran a fever for several days--turns out she had pneumonia! Elliott and Kendall made me "cookies" out of playdoh, played with Paw Patrol toys and jumped on the trampoline.

November 23

Due to the massive amount of leaves we have in our front yard, it didn't take very long for Anthony to rake this huge pile. What takes time is mulching and bagging them up! Elliott, Will and our neighbor Curran enjoyed playing in the pile, but they also helped clean the leaves up too. Lauren and I spent most of the morning in her room doing a deep clean. We moved some furniture around to fit the way she uses her room now and vacuumed and dusted and wiped baseboards. We threw away enough stuff to completely fill a large trash bag and made a large pile of clothes, toys and books she has outgrown to pass down to Elliott or donate. That evening we treated ourselves to Chick-fil-A peppermint shakes and our second family sauna session

2019 :: week 46

November 10

Anthony and I ended the weekend together on the couch, discussing our plans and commitments for the upcoming week. We aren't always good about having weekly planning sessions, but our weeks go so much better when we do. Earlier in the evening Anthony hosted a BYD where he encouraged the youth to cultivate an attitude of gratitude and showed part of a Ted Talk by Brene Brown.

November 11

A cold front blew in on Monday and when I say cold I mean COLD! It felt like it was 6 degrees outside, even though it was actually 21 degrees. After the gorgeous weekend it just felt wrong. I didn't want to leave the house, but Elliott's preschool was putting on a literacy night and he really wanted to "go to the party at [his] school!" The teachers and support staff put a lot of effort into making fun activities for the kids so I am glad we went. Several people recognized Lauren from her time as a peer model and she liked being remembered.

November 12

This was the week of Elliott wearing a baseball shirt everyday. He wore Will's old Alex Gordon shirt Friday, but I didn't get a picture of that. This is what I posted on instagram: When this kid goes all in, he goes ALL. IN. Last winter it was Greatest Showman. He requested the soundtrack daily and wore his top hat and red shirt on the regular. Recently, during the MLB playoffs he started requesting baseball hype videos on YouTube and started to smuggle his glove, bat or ball with him whenever we leave the house. When I asked him why he doesn’t ask for Greatest Showman music anymore he replied, “Mom, I’m not that guy anymore.”

November 13

On Wednesday we went to the Smith's house for  the "preschool bookclub" Heather organized. Twice a month we get together to read a few books, sing a few songs, do an activity or craft, and play. It has been good for helping Elliott be less clingy with me. His friends that participate are Gideon, Kendall, Grant, Ethan, Neal, Mikey and Penelope. In this picture Rachel is reading one of Elliott's favorite Thanksgiving themed books, Turkey Trouble.

November 14

It was my turn to host book club Thursday night. Our basement is almost finished, so I gave my friends a tour before we got started. Here we are all in the sauna. Anthony's sauna definitely gets the most "buzz," when we talk about all the updates, but the whole thing is really amazing. Sometimes I can't believe we have all of this additional intentional space! We discussed The Gurnsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which I had read before many years ago. This time around I listened to the audio-book and found it delightful. I am loving audio-books this fall. I have listened to nine audio-books since school started, mainly listening while doing chores and driving.

November 15

We had Lauren's birthday party late-over at our house Friday evening. Lauren planned the event with great care and attention to detail. She may have a future in event planning. Guests were asked to wear comfy clothes and bring a pillow and blanket. When the guests arrived they were greeted with the Kidz Bop Pandora station playing in the background and a table full of coloring pages and crayons. After they set up their stuff in the basement they came upstairs to color. While they were coloring and after everyone arrived I explained how we were going to decorate sugar cookies. Each girl got six cookies and we had several cups of frosting, candy toppings and sprinkles to share. When they were done with the cookies they washed their hands and headed to the front room to watch Lauren open her gifts. While she did that Will and I cleaned up the cookie mess and set out the plates and drinks for dinner. We had pizza for dinner and then went down to the basement to watch Descendants 3. The girls sang along and danced and had a pretty good time. I was so tired when it was all over though. She originally wanted a sleep-over, I can't imagine how tired I would have been if we had had 14 girls spend the night!

November 16

Saturday evening we had our inaugural family sauna. Elliott got too hot pretty quickly and played Smash Bros on the Switch while the rest of us sweat it out for about half and hour. It wasn't that bad. I tried stretching in the sauna once my muscles were warmed up and it felt pretty good. Who knows, maybe I will be converted to the sauna after all?

2019 :: week 45

November 3

Our trampoline is temporarily out of service. Sunday afternoon Elliott was playing in the backyard and asked Tony and I separately if he could have a knife to make "pumpkin pie" out of one of our Halloween pumpkins. We both told him no. The neighbor friend he was playing with went to his house and snuck a knife out of his kitchen. A third friend then stabbed it through the trampoline mat about thirty times.

November 4

Spending quiet mornings with these two boys is mostly wonderful. Their sweet smiles remind me of how blessed I am to be living the life I've always wanted to have. Since school has started I have been feeling frustrated with myself because I used to be able to "accomplish" so much more than I am currently. I know that having healthy, well-adjusted children is more important than checking things off my to-do list, but it is hard for me to get to the end of the day and not have tangible things to show for it. I'm much less "productive" than I was at this time last year. I have a baby that needs to nap three times a day and Elliott attends half-day preschool four afternoons a week, requiring me to spend thirty minutes driving him each way. My days are choppy and it makes it hard for me to volunteer at the elementary school, do meals on wheels or exercise like I was previously able to do. I am working on being okay with taking things slow and savoring the gummy smiles and snuggles.

November 5

Miles is 8 months old! The biggest changes that have happened in the past month are that he sleeps in his own room now and he is starting to ween himself. Unfortunately on top of only wanting to nurse when my milk is letting down and it is flowing fast and freely, he refuses all bottles so I have had to resort to feeding him formula with a medicine dropper on a few occasions. Most night he sleeps for about twelve hours with one 7-10 our stretch. I am getting more sleep and feel like a new woman. Miles can sit for long periods of time and only falls over when he gets off balance trying to look at something. He rarely scoots forward but I often find him several feet behind where I left him on the floor. He puts EVERYTHING possible in his mouth. He even tries to put the zipper pull on my jacket in his mouth when I am holding him.

November 6

The weather went from warm to cold and back to warm again this week. Between the shorter days and colder temperatures I have started taking daily mental health walks. I am trying to go in the morning before getting the kids ready for school, but go in the evening too if possible. Wednesday evening I was struck by the beauty in our neighborhood and how much I love where we live. I walked to Target to get some new bibs for Miles and then ran into some friends playing at the park. Tuesday I walked to Holy Spirit to vote, later in the week I walked to the library to return some books and our kids are able to walk to and from school daily.

November 7

Miles seems to really enjoy sitting next to the piano while Anthony plays for him. Anthony has been playing and singing more recently and we all like it.

November 8

Lauren came home from school Thursday afternoon running a fever. She had a headache in the morning, but her temperature was normal so she went to school. When we got home she laid on the couch all afternoon and was asleep in bed by 7pm. When she woke up Friday morning she was feeling great and her fever was gone. We kept her home and she and Elliott had such a fun day together. She made him worksheets--Elliott wants to learn to read--and they played with perler beads, colored popsicle sticks and organized their remaining Halloween candy together.

November 9

Saturday was busy! Next week is a busy week and we made a long list of things we needed to get done to get ready for it and we did almost everything. A big thing that we needed to get done was winterizing our yard. I cleaned out our garden and put stored the trelis, tomato cages and hoses until next year. Anthony worked on leaves and used the weed wacker to tidy up the edges of our yard. We cleaned out the garage and filled up both our trash can and our neighbor's (they are out of town until May and they let us use their can when we have overflow). Anthony took Elliott on a date (McDonalds and then baseball at the elementary school field) and Will and I went on an epic shopping trip to IKEA and Hy-Vee. By the time I got in bed that night my feet were aching, but I love checking things off a to-do list so I felt very satisfied.

2019 :: week 44

October 27

Elliott and Papa played catch Sunday evening. Elliott is a lot of fun, but not exactly consistent in his imaginative games. The game of catch represented the Red Sox playing the Patriots and the score was 200-2, or something like that. Papa also wrote out some baseball word problems for Will to solve. He worked hard and had fun learning new ways to divide. I think I can handle batting averages, but WHIPs (walks plus hits per inning pitched) give me a run for my money.

October 28

Monday was a cold, gray day. During the day the kids had school and Doug and Tina helped me with some grocery shopping and child care. That evening we went out for some bbq at Jack Stack's. When we came home Nana played hangman with Lauren and Will for quite a while. They had such a fun time coming up with phrases for each other. I think my favorite phrase was "BYU is an average team." After the kids went to bed Anthony and I enjoyed visiting with Doug and Tina for a few hours before we finally all went to bed. We had a great visit with them, despite the fact that we were busy with a variety of commitments while they were here (parent teacher conferences,birthday parties, ward activity, practices, games, etc.).

October 29

Aunt Laura flew out for the baptistm and was scheduled to fly back to Utah Tuesday afternoon. The little boys and I stopped by to say goodbye before taking Elliott to school, and just before we got there she found out her flight was cancelled. If flying west in the winter it is best to avoid layovers in Denver! It meant a lot to me and Lauren to have Laura at Lauren's baptism.

October 30

In the morning, Elliott and I walk the big kids to school and Anthony reads his scriptures and plays the piano with Miles. I love seeing that little guy perched on his dad's lap. Sometimes he tries to "sing" along.

October 31

If Halloween costumes aren't posted on the internet, did they even happen? All three of the school kids had classroom parties at the same time Thursday afternoon, which was a bit of a logistical struggle. I understand why they have them the last half hour of the day, but that made it tough to pick up Elliott. Luckily Anthony could take a late lunch break get him. I am the room parent in Lauren's classroom and unofficially "required" to be at her party. That evening we went to a party our neighbors threw, complete with hot dogs and a hayride. Tony took the older kids and Knox out trick or treating while I stayed home and passed out candy with the little boys. Miles was ready for bed and Elliott was not interested in going out. Maybe next year?

November 1

Nursing Miles has taken a sharp turn for the worse. Things started going downhill when he started biting me. I thought if I sharply told him, "No!" and stopped feeding him for a few minutes he'd get the message. Unfortunately, he keeps biting me and now my milk supply is struggling. Anyone who has breastfed knows that this can be a circular problem. Friday morning Elliott and I went to Target to buys some bottles and had the good fortune of parking next to this Kia Soul. Elliott was wearing his Salvador Perez shirt in honor of the 4th anniversary of the Royals winning the World Series (and because his Mookie Betts shirt is in the wash).

November 2

Lauren and Miles have a lot in common, including eczema. Lauren is a great helper when it is time to give Miles a bath, holding him in the tub while I wash his hair and body. He much prefers being in the big tub to bathing in the kitchen sink. After they bath in baking soda and water we pat them dry  we moisturize with CeraVe, and apply prescription strength hydro-cortisone to the bad patches.