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!

Grateful for Personal Revelation

The past two days, I've been re-reading my journal, starting the summer before I met Todd.  I was consistently writing a couple pages a week, so I've got a pretty good record.  I've read through our entire courtship and the first few months of our marriage, and will start tomorrow with my first entry after we moved to California.

I thanked Heavenly Father in my prayers tonight for what I'm about to write, then turned out the light and tried to go to sleep.  Immediately, I felt impressed to get up and share it on my blog.  I'm happy to do so.

In February of 2004, Todd and I had decided to pray about getting married.  When we did, we each got the impression that we should keep thinking about it.  So I'd been pondering it for a few weeks, praying, making Todd pro/con lists, analyzing the future the best I could.  My biggest worry was Todd's military involvement. The idea of a deployed husband freaked me out.  I did not like that piece of the Todd/Angie Future puzzle.

Thursday, February 26, 2004 I recorded in my journal:

"Last night Todd and I went to the movie theater... On the drive home, I watched Todd as he drove and thought about what it might be like to be with him our whole lives, to grow old with him.

"Then suddenly and strongly, I had this whooshing, warm, clear feeling all through my chest that I can marry him, and everything will be alright.  Todd is good, he will take care of me, and if he has to go to war everything will be okay.  These thoughts and feelings were very definitely not my own.  They were from the Holy Ghost.  I know they were.  I needed a confirmation like that, because sometimes I can't tell if I'm receiving inspiration or having my own thoughts.  This was very clearly not my own thoughts.  When I prayed last night, I thanked Heavenly Father, and I was worried I would feel differently when I talked to Him about it, but I didn't. That was a confirmation of the trueness of the event. (!)"  

I have held on to the anchor of that revelation countless times.  It was my rock for the next seven months until Todd finally dared propose to me.  It's given me peace over the past eight and a half years of our marriage that I made a good match.  It's taken fear away from my heart during both of Todd's deployments.

Beyond that, it speaks volumes to me about God.  He heard my prayers and answered them.  Not while I was on my knees, but after weeks of sincere pondering.  He made sure that answer was crystal clear and undeniably a message from heaven and not my own thoughts and wishes.  He understood my worries.  He gave comfort that has lasted nearly a decade so far.  He didn't take away my agency.  He didn't proclaim, "Todd's The One!" but instead spoke to my concerns and gave me peace about them, then let me choose Todd myself, trusting he was a sound choice.

I am grateful for personal revelation, and I am thankful I am a journal writer.

July Update

Well, here I am, another month down and I didn't slim down the job by blogging throughout.  Sigh.  I thought about it a lot.  But it never seemed worth the time.  So here we are.

The Fourth of July was Jack's half birthday, so it was an especially big and special holiday.  We started off the morning with a flag fruit pizza, then went to a parade and came back with a massive haul.  Behold:

 By the way, that is a gallon sized ziplock you are looking at there.  The "parade candy" is kept in a cupboard and given out as bribery for sleeping well.

My dad set up tarps and a hose on their hill and voila, Hazel experienced her very first slip and slide.  A massive hit, I must say.  But only for Hazel.  Jack's going through a phase where he hates playing in water.

 The kids thought it was fun to dress in red, white, and blue.

Both the kids napped long and hard, so we were able to head out for fireworks that night.   For the last several years, we've watched them from our roof while the kids slept and have been too far away to hear the BOOM.  Being at the ballpark where they were set off, hearing them, smelling them, filled me with a truckload of happiness.  It was totally worth not having the kids in bed until 11pm.  

Hazel taped her baby doll to her Rapunzel "hair" so she could pretend she was lifting Mother Gothel into the tower.  Ingenious.  

Jack's dress-up love continues...

Hazel made herself and Gemma matching crowns.  Sister love!

Jack started showing interest in potty training, but has been spotty about it.  I am absolutely not going to push it.  I invested far too much time into trying to potty train Hazel.  I'm going to take it easy this time.  

Remember the birds' nest on my front porch?  We thought it was so cool... until the eggs hatched and the babies started leaving huge piles of poop by my front door.  Disgusting.  I dealt with it for two weeks, until the babies left the nest, and then I took the thing down.  A week later, the parent birds came back to lay another clutch and I've been battling them ever since.  Every day they start making their nest.  Every day I power spray it down.  Their persistence makes me angry.  Time to relocate, pals!

We spent a few days down in Cedar City with cousins.  We loved every second.  We partied at the local aquatic center and caught a flick at the dollar theater, but for the most part just played at home.  Laura's backyard is massive, and the kids were so happy to play together.

Jack was especially obsessed with the kid jeep.  If I ever didn't know where he was, the first place to look was the garage.  He was usually sitting in the jeep waiting for someone to start it.  He literally drove it around in the road for two hours straight.

Hazel and Jack love to make massive play structures that impede my goal of usable living space, but they play so well together I have to let it go.  Puppy house.

This one's a poacher's jaguar trap.  They snarled at me quite fiercely through the chair bars.  

More of Hazel's elaborate birthday party set-ups.  The paper bag with the straw sticking out of it is supposed to be a lemonade pitcher.  The blue vase behind it is holding a massive rose made out of scotch tape.  And yes, those are individual servings of Goldfish, large enough to count as lunch.

Gemma had her six-month check-up.  The doctor was concerned that her weight dropped so much on the growth chart.  14lbs at 4 months and again at 6 months.  I think it's mostly just that I hadn't started her on solids yet and she's being compared to kids who have been chowing down on formula and rice cereal for two months, but she's going in for a weight check in a few weeks.

We celebrated Gemma's half-birthday by giving her her first rice cereal.  Hazel loves to help feed Gemma.  G loves to be fed.  She hasn't turned anything down yet.

Jack continued to have trouble with bad dreams, so I decided to move the room around a bit.  I asked Jack what he would like me to do to make his room seem safer, and he asked to be close to the window and close to Hazel.  The extra sunlight and a buddy he can see without sitting up have seemed to do the trick.  He's sleeping a lot better so far.  Knock on wood.

My sister Emily came in from Chicago for a week and a half.  I jumped at the chance to plan a family reunion and got all my siblings up here on the 24th of July.

Everyone was in charge of planning an activity.  Mine was a Crack the Egg Tournament on the tramp.  Ryan was the undisputed champion.  He made me suffer for 15 minutes trying to crack him.  It was torture.

Emily's activity was karaoke.  It got a little wild and crazy!

 We went to another parade and the kids weren't even that excited.  Three in one summer is overkill.

Gemma started pushing up on her knees and on her toes.  She also rolls and scoots all over the room.  And her neck is ridiculously ticklish.  She laughs so cute.

Hazel started taking private swimming lessons, and I have to say, I never want to do group lessons again!  She is learning so much, so fast, and I love that she spends the entire 30 minutes working and focused.

Slice of Paradise

The best part about this house is our backyard.  It is glorious.  My bishop changed my life when he and his son put up temporary fencing for me six weeks ago.  We were outside a lot before, but now that they don't have to come in with me when I check on Gemma, or make dinner, or switch a load of laundry, the kids have been pretty much living outside.  And who could blame them?  

We've got a great big deck for riding little bikes and digging in the sand table, a kiddie pool to splash in, and a playhouse that is frequently used as a set for playing either house or Cruella DeVille/dogs.  

 We've got a trampoline and oodles of grass, and a great tree for climbing.

 And my personal favorite, a gliding loveseat, perfect for nursing a baby while the others play, or snuggling up together (sometimes all four of us) to read a good book.

 I will probably get depressed when the snow comes and we're not out here for hours every day.

I HEART having a backyard!!!