September Review

 September has been an eventful and exciting month for our family.   The changing of the seasons has made me feel like time is finally passing, and we're getting a little bit closer to Todd's return.  We passed the half-way mark and got past the endless summer, which makes the end of winter seem a lot closer.

Hazel started preschool after Labor Day.

I am really excited about the preschool I found for her this fall.  She does an art project every single school day, and has lots of time to learn through play.  It's a much more creative set-up than what I had her in when we first moved here, and so far, I've been really pleased.  It's run within a recreation center, and in addition to her preschool class, she gets to attend tumbling, movement, and swimming classes.  It has been a good fit for Hazel's artistic and energetic persona.

Gemma crawls everywhere now, so we've got a gate at the top of the stairs.  Hazel can climb over it, but Jack cannot, unfortunately, so he needs my help to go downstairs to play.  A few days ago, I forgot to ask him where he wanted to be before I took Gemma into her room for a nap.  When I came back out 15 minutes later, I was surprised and happy to see Hazel's creative solution.  She brought the set upstairs to Jack.  Do you see their shadows?  They were playing puppy and owner.  

We've had some really fabulous weather this month.  I've been encouraging everyone to play outside as much as possible.  The kids have no idea what's coming; they simply have no concept of winter.  It drives me nuts when they don't want to go out and play when it's 65 degrees outside.  

I tried an intensive "potty camp" with Jack.  He loved wearing underwear and watching movies and eating salty snacks all day, but just wasn't making ANY progress on identifying when he needed to go potty.  I threw in the towel a day and a half in and felt liberated.  I packed up the froggy potty and told Jack we'd try again when he was a little older, and have made zero efforts to have him use the potty since.  For now, diapers are worlds easier than potty training.

After lots of searching, we found a local u-pick apple orchard that was in business this year.  Apparently, it's been a bad year for apples.  We were happy we were able to keep up our September apple-picking tradition, although I much prefer the orchard we have gone to in California for the past few years.

 Todd's parents, Larry and Ellen, came home from their mission to Estonia. The entire family (minus Todd and Erika's husband Steve) met them at the airport, went out to eat, spent the night, and had a reunion the next day.  Hazel latched on to Todd's brother KB and would not leave his side.  Thankfully, he seemed to enjoy it and was totally sweet to her.

I got to celebrate my birthday all weekend, at the Bonner's on Saturday, and at my parents' house on Sunday.  Someone asked me how old I was turning, and I had to think about it, and actually calculated wrong and told them 33.  It didn't even hit me until the next day that I was only 32!  Is it weird that I don't know how old I am anymore?

Larry and Ellen came up to my house the next week and spent the night, so they could spend some time with the kids.  Hazel and Jack were thrilled to have them visit.  

 Gemma's had a big month.  She got faster at crawling, learned how to sit up, finally got her first tooth, began pulling up to a stand, and has even let go while standing, trying to balance.

She even got to sit in the front of the shopping cart for the first time.  

Now she crawls to the bathroom door when we're all hiding behind it, brushing teeth and doing hair and trying to keep her out.  She's always right outside the room when we open the door.  She stands at the stair banister when the other kids are downstairs, wishing she was with them, and she hangs out by the back door when she wants to be outside.  

Jack has started mothering his Snuggle Pup.  He often tucks him in for a nap, then comes out of his room shushing us, saying we need to be quiet so we don't wake Snuggle Pup up.

We've gone to the canyon a couple of times.   The kids absolutely love it.  They explore and throw rocks in the water and find leaves to take home and are always disappointed when I tell them it's time to leave.

The leaves are changing color!  It's so beautiful.  Fall is my favorite season, and I really miss it when I'm in California.  

 Todd gave me a crackdown when I was telling him about some reward Hazel was doing chores to earn.  He said she needs to work just because she's supposed to work.  So I started making her empty the dishwasher every day to contribute to family life.  She made a HUGE fuss about it for about a week, then suddenly announced that she loved to do it.  She always wants to listen to Pandora on my phone while she works, and she does it cheerfully and quickly most days.  I have absolutely loved having one less chore to do myself, and can't wait to incorporate more into Hazel's contribution.  I have also started making Jack help me put away laundry whenever I'm working on it while he's awake.

We are working on Halloween costumes over here!  I am not a year-round creator, but I love making Halloween costumes for some reason.  It is very satisfying.  Can you guess what Hazel's going to be this year?  I'll give you a hint: Jack's being Peter Pan.  

 I'll leave you with this little Gem:

August Review

I don't even remember August.  This post will be short and sweet, mostly just pictures.  

Jack discovered the Peter Pan dress-up and has worn it a bunch, leaving dresses and butterfly wings in the dust (although he still loves the clip-clop shoes (and has a flower clip in his hair)).  He may be Peter for Halloween.  We shall see.

Hazel embellished our dinner with personalized fancy toothpicks.  Jack got tiger stripes, she had cheetah spots and zebra stripes.  She is gaga for animal print anything!

She pulled her bangs out of her face for the picture.  Jack does absolutely everything his big sister does, and followed suit.  He is a major copy cat.

Jack has had quite a bit of success using the potty, although I still wish we weren't attempting potty training yet.  When am I going to have a kid who knocks it out in a week?  Jack's going to be a dragger, just like Hazel.  He knows how to go, but doesn't keep his diaper dry, and is really inconsistent with his interest level.  He's already learned how to milk the system, claiming to need to pee-pee whenever he wants me to sit down and read a book with him.  He will hold it through the entire book, too, hoping to get a second one read to him.

I love, love, love our trampoline/backyard.  If Gemma needs to go to bed first, I send the big kids outside to play until bed, and they stay happy out there for a loooooong time. Thank goodness!

Hazel took private swim lessons.  I think I wrote about this in July?  She did it for several weeks, and picked up on the skills really quickly.  It was fun to have that "date time" with her and me as well.  We often ran a quick errand together before coming home, while my mom stayed at the house with the nappers.

My parents and I took the kids on a "hike," that ended up being just an outing at the Logan River.  We found a great inlet where the water was super shallow, and the kids had a major party wading in the water and tossing rocks in.

My heart melted when I spotted this scene.  Look at Jack with his arm around Gemma!  He is so naturally sweet and snuggly.  Hazel and Jack both adore Gemma and are so great with her.  They love to feed her and try to make her laugh.  Hazel is always really great about staying near Gemma and playing with her while I shower or get some other job done.

They found the enormous blanket sleepers in the storage drawer in their dresser and proceeded to plague me for the next two days playing Baby.  Everyone whining and crawling and crying for help because they got stuck under the furniture... Such a delight!  (I have since hidden the blanket sleepers in a much more secure location.)

Jacko fell and split the back of his head (while wearing the afore-mentioned blanket sleeper) and had to take an emergency trip to the doctor's office.  Thankfully, stitches were not needed - glueing was sufficient - so he didn't have too traumatic of an experience.  Two weeks later, there's still crusty glue on his hair, and he still won't lay down flat on his head.  I don't know if it still hurts, or if the glue just makes it uncomfortable.  It's looking lots better.

When Jack saw this picture on my phone, he said, "Here I am, making mischief."  Yep.  He was supposed to be going potty, it takes forever and I left him there to actually DO IT after I read a book, and he decided it was a good time to get into my lotion and earrings instead.  Busted!

Can't remember... pretty sure they were pretending I was a pirate while I did my hair and makeup in the morning.  They asked me to tie them up in their blankets.  I just thought it was so darn cute.

Gemma's crawling all over the place, so we're constantly doing floor checks for choking hazards.  She's not sitting up yet, but she's doing the hip sit.  She had her weight check and is making her way back up in the percentages.  Nothing to worry about.  Don't you just want to smooch all that soft, squishy skin?

Girl's Weekend

Over Labor Day weekend, Hazel, Gemma and I flew to California to recharge with our best friends.  Jacko stayed in Utah and had a "vacation" with my parents.

We flew out of Provo airport and into Oakland, taking advantage of an outrageous deal with Allegiant Airlines.  Awesome Suzanne Hope drove to Oakland to pick us up and take us back.

After a rendezvous with a handful of friends at a park, Chrissy, Suzanne and I left our big kids with the husbands and made a beeline out of there.  Gordon assumed responsibility for Hazel for the next two days and did an incredible job keeping her, Spencer, and Nova occupied, fed, and safe.  The three of them were off-the-wall excited to be reunited.  Gordon kept texting us pictures, all filled with kids with beaming smiles and arms around each other.

Our only foux-paus was that I overlooked pulling Hazel's bangs back before I left Friday night.  I tried to instruct Gordon on the art of ponytail usage over the phone, but to no avail.  Luckily, Dan does Nova's hair on occasion and was able to salvage a hairstyle when he arrived Saturday morning.

 The kids watched movies, went to the park, made crowns, played in the swimming pool, ate burgers in the front yard, and that's all I know.  BECAUSE I WASN'T WITH THEM!  Gordon and Dan sent us lots of pictures, which we were all excited to see.  I think Chrissy and Suzanne felt the same way I did, wanting to hear funny stories and see cute pictures and know what the kids were doing, but soaking up the feeling of being completely void of responsibility and not having to do any of the work.

Chrissy, Suzanne, and I went out to eat, took the babies for a walk, waited too long to go swimming so by the time we got in the pool it was shady and freezing, played card games, and talked, talked, talked. Mostly we lounged around at the hotel while Gemma and Daniel took naps, luxuriating in the wonderful feeling of not being needed by any demanding kiddos and soaking up the strength that comes from the support of loving friends.  

Daniel is only two weeks older than Gemma.  Chrissy and I matched up for our whole pregnancies.  It was interesting for me to watch them, Daniel sitting up, Gemma crawling, Daniel a good six pounds heavier than G, both of them so curious about each other.

We came back Sunday morning, but not before making a pact to turn this girl's weekend into an annual celebration.  We are slated for the last weekend of July 2014.  Can't wait!

We went to church at our home ward of three years, Woodland Park ward.  I told Todd afterward, it was so comforting for me to be around people who know and love us.  To have people asking how Todd is and how often I get to talk to him, not because they're curious about our situation and wonder how I'm managing, but because they really care about my family and are praying for us and are invested in our getting through this year well.  I felt so completely supported and loved and truly wished I had brought Jack with me after all and we could have stayed for a month.

That evening, we had dinner with Natalie Moss and her family.  It felt so familiar, just like we had never left.  She often invited us over for dinner when Todd was out of town.  It was like time stopped and we were not experiencing a deployment right now.  It was strengthening.

Sunday night, Gemma wouldn't settle down and go to sleep.  She does that sometimes when she is really overtired.  Gordon offered to hold her and sing to her, walk the halls of his house and try to get her to sleep so I could go to bed, too.  We had an early flight the next morning.  After 30 minutes, Gemma was still crying, and I had a hunch she would need a ride in the car to knock her out.  I got out of bed to ask Gordon if I could borrow their van and drive Gemma around.  And he asked if he could do it for me.  Said there was a radio show just starting he'd love to listen to anyway. Who does that?  Who drives someone else's cranky baby around in the car for an hour?   I'm overwhelmed by how wonderful my friends are.

Hazel was an incredible traveler, super cheerful and helpful the entire time.  We read chapter books on the plane and she pushed Gemma's stroller in the airport.  She crashed on the drive home from Provo.  She partied hard!