Christmas Letter 2009

Anticipation

Four more days til Christmas. And let me tell you, it has been a loooong time getting to this week. I can prove it, too, since we have four different Christmas countdowns in various places around the house, presents that have been counted and rearranged and counted and rearranged again, and a certain six year old who is about to go into cardiac arrest waiting for Christmas morning to finally arrive. We were doing okay until I decided to wrap all the presents from Grandma and Grandpa P and put them under the tree one night a week or so ago, after the kids had gone to bed. When Emily awoke the next morning and discovered the new additions, she could hardly contain herself, and has sighed dramatically and said "I just can't wait until Christmas!!" countless times since. The child was so obsessed that I actually threatened to take some away if she couldn't get a hold of herself. It's calmed down a bit, but I still have to remind the kids to leave the presents under the tree every so often. As a sampling of both her gift enthusiasm and her writing, here are two notes that Emily wrote for Kimberly and I, all on her own:

Also, I am exceptionally proud of myself for actually putting together matching Christmas outfits for all three kids this year. I found these dresses at a second-hand store and was thrilled to find matching colors but not identical styles, and then I found the tie and shirt at another store for Calvin and just couldn't resist, it was too perfect. Aren't they adorable?!?

Baby, it's bone-freezin' cold outside!

It is cold. This morning, it was 2 degrees F--possibly less. Now, after noon, it's warmed up to a nice toasty 8. I think the high is supposed to be 14, but I have my doubts about getting there. I picked up Emily from school, and the walk from the car to the school was enough to make my ears hurt it the arctic wind, and my fingers numb even inside the gloves. There are about 6 inches of snow on the ground, and not a bit of it is melting off the street, so driving is interesting. Did you know that cold, dry, squeaky snow is actually very slippery? It is. I've had to practice the rocking back and forth out of snow drifts a couple times now, and it is always interesting to wonder if this might actually be the time where you get good and stuck. Fortunately, that hasn't happened yet.
Also, can someone please invent a silence bubble that you can pop over a screaming toddler when you are in public places? It needs to be air-permeable, but not sound. Think you could do that? It would be so much easier to get grocery shopping done and various other errands without having to either a) drop everything and vacate the premises so they don't destroy the eardrums of everyone else in the store and to find a private place to wait it out or discipline them, or b)give in to the tantrum to shut them up but at the same time encourage these tantrums to continue because you give them what they want when they do it! Can you imagine how great it would be, once they started screaming because they want something they can't have, to just throw the bubble over them (oh, it needs to be compactible so I can store it in my purse) and continue shopping in blissful silence until they realize the tantrum is not getting them anywhere? Oh well, I can dream, can't I?

Em is six! Company for the holiday...

So Emily is six years old. Wow. Somebody told me the other day I didn't look old enough to have a six year old. That was nice, and weird to think that I'm old enough to have someone be surprised at how old my kids are. It's a complicated emotion. Anyway, she wanted a butterfly cake, since for her last birthday she had a caterpillar cake. She's logical like that. It's nowhere near professional, but she was happy with it. Cake decorating is not my forte. Give me paper and pencil anyday. It's a lot more controllable. At least she was happy with it, and the candy cane antennae were her idea.

Her favorite present: a webkin horse that she has now named "Jane." Don't ask me why, I don't know. But she loves it. Thanks Aunt Laura and Uncle Jason! We even had a vague idea of what the heck a webkin was.

The second favorite gift: a charm necklace from Grandma Karen, with different charms. She wears it all the time and loves accessorizing with it so it matches her outfit each day. At least I have one kid with a sense of color coordination... G&G also got her some giant fuzzy posters to color, and she thought that was pretty cool.

This picture is in here because it makes me laugh. Kimmie wanted to give Emily a gift, and her big idea was that she wanted to give Em toothpaste. It makes me laugh because it's Kimmie that hates mint toothpaste (too spicy) and wanted the kids bubblegum stuff again, not Emily. No ulterior motives here....

I didn't post the pictures of the gifts from G&G Butler, since they got to see them opened in person. I hope that's okay. It's so fun to be able to share birthdays with family. Still a bit of a novelty for me. I also didn't post the pictures of the stuff we got her: new Dora work gloves so she can help in the yard (she asked for them!), and new pajamas--purple, of course.

For Thanksgiving my sister Melissa and her husband Ammon (sorry, I have no idea how to put the accent over the o, but it's there in spirit) came out from Utah. They were good sports as we went down to John's parents and had the feast at a place where they didn't know anyone. I think they had fun playing football and soccer and ultimate anyway. It's a good thing they like games, because I think that's about all they did all three days they were here. The kids wouldn't give them a moment's peace and were climbing all over them and begging to be spun or thrown or chased or piggy-backed or read to or played with every single second. They even shared the pirate pinata they had from Ammon's bday with the kids, and cemented their place in the kids' hearts by providing something they could whack with a big stick and get candy out of. Thanks for being patient, guys, I'm sure you were exhausted by the time you left and I hope you had as much fun as we did. Thanks for coming!!

thoughts and colds

Calvin sprouted a fever a couple nights ago, just out of nowhere, and life has been kind of "nnngh" ever since. His fever broke after getting up to at least 104 and spending half the night with me on the couch, but has continued with a croupy cough and runny nose and a general state of crankiness and waking up at night. Then today Emily and John have been sneezing and runny-nosed all day long and I have that pre-sickness scratchiness in my throat and feel tired. Of course this week is my week to host preschool. Of course.
Today I was laying in bed trying to decide if I was going to sleep or not, and John came in and asked if I was feeling sick or just feeling down. Hmm. I have a sinking feeling that "feeling down" happens more often than I realize but I'm not sure what exactly to do about it. I am trying to get on a regular exercise schedule and hopefully that will help.
Speaking of exercise, I got a pilates workout dvd from the library and after two days I am sore in places I forgot existed. After the first day, my forearms were sore for some ridiculous reason! Either I am way out of shape, or this is one heck of a workout. Probably both.
I also checked out a book by "Dr. Laura" called "In Praise of Stay-at-Home Moms" hoping it would be a booster for me but really it just says stuff I already know and depresses me when she spouts how important moms are because I think of everything I'm not doing. I got through the first couple chapters and then set it down.
I miss my friends in Kentucky. I feel blessed to be closer to family, that has been awesome, but making friends has never been easy for me and for some reason it feels a little harder here. Maybe it's just because I'm still new, and I'm also heading into that phase where the women in my peer group are all extremely busy with their families and school-going kids and such. Patience, Iago... I've never been a great one at just calling people up to talk on the phone, but it looks like I'm going to have to learn. There are some great people here, it's just a slow process I guess.
Well, that's probably more than anyone wanted to know. I feel kind of like Meg Ryan in "You've Got Mail," putting thoughts out into the void. Well, "good night, void."

snow and halloween

Here's some more pictures of our winter snow from a couple weeks ago. If you compare this picture to the one from the last post, you can see how fast the snow was falling. The first one was taken at nine in the morning, this one was taken at 1:15pm, and it continued much the same the rest of the day. I think we ended up with a foot and a half.

I took the kids out to play in it, because John guilted me into it, and swore I'd never do it again. It was about 19 degrees, and the wind was blowing. 45 minutes prep and crying to go out, half an hour, maybe an hour, of playing and good pictures (interspersed with crying), and 45 minutes of prep to go back in and crying and warming up after. Bleh.

We have the nicest neighbors who I discovered out armed with a snowblower and shovels clearing off our sidewalk and driveway for us. Otherwise John and I would have some serious back injuries from trying to clean it all up. I haven't seen that much snow in years. And it all fell in a day! It was so funny watching Calvin trying to walk in the snow. It was up to his thighs. Even Kimmie was having some difficulties.

Kimmie by the snowbank at the end of our driveway. Gives you an idea of how much snow we got. The snowbank wasn't much higher than the rest of the snow in the yard.

All the snowbunnies. We tried to build a little snow slide. It didn't work very well. I think I'll stick to my earlier premise: snow is prettier when you are looking through a window. Preferably with a cup of cocoa and a good book.

Ah, Halloween. It's becoming less and less enjoyable for me every year, though the kids love it. Fortunately the costumes weren't any work at all this year. The kids had a great time, of course. Kimmie was the first to throw in the towel, she has about as much tolerance for cold as I do. Calvin was next, he was a popsicle. Emily was the endurance trick or treater, and kept going after everyone else was done. And she had the spoils to show for it! One lady was handing out homemade fabric bags full of candy, trail mix, and a two-dollar bill, and Emily got two because she was the last trick-or-treater for the night. She was very generous in sharing her full candy bowl with her siblings, though Calvin challenged her philanthropy by his own active belief in "finders keepers." Of course, it's all gone now (thankfully) except for my bowl of candy from the 3 bags I bought to hand out, when maybe 20 kids showed up at our door. It was actually a very peaceful evening, I just sat and read my book in between doorbell rings. Now we have lots of leftover candy, which suits John just fine. Oh, if you can't tell from the picture, Kimmie is a ballerina, Calvin a dragon, and Emily a fairy. Happy Halloween.

winter storm!

So the kids went to bed with rain, we went to bed with the snow starting to cover the ground, and this is what we woke up with. From the second picture you can see on the fence that it's snowed at least 4 inches, and we have a whole lot more on the way! The school district automated system called at 6am this morning to say school was cancelled. Yeah, thanks. So pretty, though, as long as I don't have to go out in it!!

Furniture and dresses

So I bought us some bedroom furniture. Like a matching set. Whoa. It was a dramatic purchase and John wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea but he's come around and likes it almost as much as I love it. :) I think it's great. We haven't exactly worked out the layout in the room but it's beautiful and I love my room!

Here's pictures of my window decorating since I got requests from family. First the outside view, then the inside. With the flash you don't really get the effect of the light shining through from behind when it's dark outside, but take my word for it--it's pretty cool. If I do say so myself...

So I hardly ever buy the girls new frilly matching dresses, more because of my hatred of shopping and my really expensive taste that gets me in trouble than anything, so when I found two matching dresses at a kids second-hand clothes shop I was ecstatic because they were cheap and adorable. Here they are:

Pardon the rather enthusiastic expressions, I was telling them to say things like "french fries" and "milkshake" instead of "cheese", and they got a little excited. On Saturday we took the kids to Red Robin because Emily won a free milkshake there from school, and since the last time we've been out to eat as a family (except for special occasions when extended family was in town) was about three years ago, they were pretty stoked. French fries and milkshakes are pretty exciting things currently.

So there you are. There's our life in a nutshell. As far as John and I go, John has just gotten a lot more responsibility at work, so he is going to be busy, but it is a good thing and he's excited to learn some new things. I have been busy avoiding house projects and have been singing a lot in church with choir and stuff. It's been a lot of fun, it's just a little weird to have people identify me as a singer since that's been fairly new for me. I like it though. Happy Halloween to all this week! May you have fun and not get too sick on the candy you snitch from your kids' bowls! That is, if you are anything like me...

it's autumn-time...

Or is it winter?? We have snow on the ground here. 2 inches, at least, fell on Friday night. Crazy and cold. Strange when the snow falls before the leaves have even fallen off the trees. But since it got so cold, all the leaves on our tree out front just dropped off in one day. John thinks it's great, we only have to rake once! Well, maybe twice. It looks kind of strange though, yards covered in snow, and then a blanket of leaves on top of that. Haven't seen that before. Also weird that the day before we had snow it was 65 out and the kids were playing outside in t-shirts!

So I have been informed that I am remiss in my posting duties, so here's the update--in photos, of course. However, they are somewhat backwards in order because I am too tired to drag them all into the right order, so you'll just have to bear with me here...

A couple weeks ago, we went up the canyon to see the fall colors. The kids had a great time throwing rocks in the river and clambering around. After living in Kentucky, the fall leaves were a bit of a disappointment, but it was still pretty. Poor Kimmie slipped off a rock and got her feet soaked in the freezing cold water, but I think being carried around in a nice warm blanket by her dad the rest of the time mollified her and prevented any permanent scarring.

This picture is from a very blustery day that we had. 60 mph gusts! The girls had fun running around and gathering up the many branches that got blown off of all the trees surrounding our house. We were at the park earlier when the wind first picked up and it nearly blew Calvin off of the rock he was trying to climb over!

I thought this picture was great because Calvin is being the quintessential boy. He loves playing in the dirt and stayed out here, perfectly content playing alone, for at least an hour. Boys will be boys.

Mid-September I got to fly out all by my lonesome and visit my sisters. We had a great time together and I really enjoyed the break. Thanks so very very much to John for taking time off work so I could go and to my sisters for hosting me. Life doesn't get much better when your family are your best friends.

John was an absolute trooper flying solo with the kids for the weekend. He wanted to take them camping but Calvin ended up with a high fever all weekend (came down with it the day before I left, making it very hard to leave!) so John decided to stay home. He was very disappointed and I felt bad for him, but it wasn't a complete loss... they decided to camp in the backyard instead! John had to throw in the towel in the middle of the night because the two youngest would not settle down and go to sleep, but they still got the marshmallows and hot dogs in. Even some face painting with the leftover ashes in the morning!

Here's a video of Kimmie and Calvin doing one of their favorite things... dancing! They know how to work that keyboard better than I do. I swear Calvin was dancing, but as soon as I pull out the camera... the boy refuses to perform. Notice Kimmie's got the groove on, though! She's a four-year-old salsa dancer!

The next is Calvin, I finally caught him singing! He's pretty good. He's started singing "give said the little stream" with me at bedtime, and I've even overheard him singing the "abc" song. Have I taught him that yet? No. He picks up so much from his sisters. The other night he requested "Follow Prophet!" for his bedtime song and I had no idea he even knew the thing. They must sing it in nursery. John told me Calvin even corrected him when he mixed up the words of the chorus! He's really getting so good with talking in full sentences and John and I will just look at each other and laugh at the things that come out of his mouth. A couple days I asked him to do something for me and he comes over to me and says "I don't think so!" Smarmy little bugger but I couldn't help cracking up laughing, it was so funny hearing that in his little voice. Gee, I wonder where he got that phrase... Oh, the end of the video is classic because whenever he sees me with the camera he'll stop whatever it is he's doing (that I'm trying to catch on film) and paste a grin on his face and say, "Cheeeeese!!!" Love it.

Family!!

My parents, brother and sister came out to visit for a few days. Not long enough, in my book, but we had fun while they were here. We went up to RM National Park and drove a road that wound through the very tops of the mountains. It was beautiful, and windy, and a teensy bit nerve-wracking. But John was a very good driver and even managed to remain patient with my constant driving "advice". Sorry, hun. I get way too uptight when I'm nervous.

Here's my brother Brian and my sister Melissa at our first, of many, stops along the way.

I think this picture is my favorite, it cracks me up. At the first stop we didn't realize how cold it was, and windy! With cold wind blowing in your face, short sleeves, and the bright sun directly in your eyes, these kids convey perfectly how it felt up there!

Here's Em scowling at a chipmunk--notice the jacket. There were signs all over telling you not to feed the wildlife, but obviously it didn't deter people. These chipmunks were practically climbing on the kids' shoes looking for treats! (We didn't feed them.)My mom and Emily at another stop. Still windy, still cold! But great views. My mom gave the girls these little polkadot purses, and they hardly ever let go of them! My dad and Kimmie. See the purse?
Calvin posing for a picture. He's got the "cheese" down, now if we can just get him to look at the camera! We were in the car for a good 3-4 hours, and he didn't have a meltdown once! One close call, but overall he was such a trooper!
Brian and the view. I can't figure out when my little brother turned into a man. Weird.
Kimmie smiling for a picture! That's getting somewhat rare, lately. Unless, of course, it's Grandma or Grandpa taking the picture. Maybe I have to ply her with more treats before I ask her to smile. :) Ha. Sorry, not gonna happen. That's the grandparents' job.

Brian, Melissa, Kimmie, and Dad. Love it.

Calvin and John. We went down the other side of the mountains to build a fire and have dinner. John took Calvin down to the river to see the moose on the other side and to play in the water and do what boys do when they are camping. We saw elk, deer, and moose on the trip, and were serenaded during dinner by elk bugling. All in all, a very successful trip.

Emily collecting some flowers. The girls harvested a good deal of the wildflowers around our campfire. Kimmie brought some to Grandma and said they were for her wedding, in case she has another one... Calvin even got in on the action. He came running up to me, put a little buttercup in my hand saying, "For YOU!!!" and went running off again. Inherited both his father's kindness and subtlety, it would seem.

Cooking marshmallows, the favorite time of the night!!

Three campfire bugs, and the primary consumers of the bag of marshmallows, I suspect. Although I have to admit, I helped.

The crew! Minus John, who was taking the picture and was an integral part of the day even though he's not pictured here. I love my family! I love that we are close enough now that they can drive out to visit (albeit a very long drive). Thank you so much for coming out, we loved having you here. Come back soon!!!

Happy Birthday Calvin!

Calvin is now two. I can't believe how fast he is growing up. He is an active, kind, headstrong, polite, loving, independent boy. And if that seems like a lot of contradictions all put together, well... then it is pretty accurate, because that's how life is with a two-year-old!
I made him a train cake. It turned out pretty cute. Nothing professional, of course, but he thought it was pretty darn cool, and that was what mattered.
We were so excited to have both my parents and John's parents here for the birthday celebration. Here is the picture of everyone at dinner... in our new house, with all this family there for a special day. I can't tell you how many times I wished for something like this while we were living out east, and I can't tell you how it felt to actually have it come true. Thank you all so much for coming and celebrating with us!!

Here's my dad with Emily and Calvin, as we were getting ready for the party. The kids had so much fun with all the attention they got! Now that they are gone, these next few days are going to be quite a let-down, I can tell you.This was such a great picture. Gary and Richard with all the kids piled on their laps reading two different books at the same time. Uncles are the best.
Blowing out the candles!! Can you see Emily coaching him in the background? She's so diligent about helping her younger siblings and keeping them in line. :) Calvin had more trouble with these than with my birthday cake, go figure! But we got there eventually. :) He still did them all by himself! This one's for Jason. And I'm sorry to say that this was about as messy as he got. He was more interested in the presents than eating cake. I don't think he even finished half of his piece. And not a smidge in the hair. Sorry. But it sure made clean-up easier!
Presents!!! It was so fun watching him open these. He wasn't very aggressive about opening them, but he was delighted with all the contents! I bought him a large dump truck for his birthday, and made the mistake of not wrapping it and just setting it by the other presents with a big red bow on it. Sometime while we were cleaning up dinner he discovered it. I didn't even get to see him take the bow off! First thing I knew, he was driving it all over the room. Oh well, at least he liked it. He kept driving it into the fireplace and saying, "Crash!!" Definitely a boy.
He got some giant legos (loved the little cat in the set), he's actually playing with those right now.

He also got this "giant googly ball." You can tell from the picture that he wasn't completely sure about the thing. It lights up when you bounce it, and John would squish it and it would look like a giant sea urchin from space. He was kind of morbidly fascinated with it.

I think one of the favorites of the night was the dinosaurs! Good job, Richard, in snapping this picture mid-roar!! He loved them. He was playing with Grandpa P. with them later, as I heard, and would alternate between screaming and running away when Grandpa's dinosaur would "roar" and swooping down to smash the dickens out of it with his own dinosaur. As I said, definitely a boy.

Happy Birthday, my little monkey! We love you tons, you bring so much joy to our family. I remember being so nervous about having a boy coming to our family (I was a wolf cub scout den leader at the time) but I wouldn't trade you for anything. I think I felt that way the moment you were born, all 10 pounds of you!!

Favorite food: Candy!

Favorite toy: scooter, then dinosaurs, or balls, or cars...

Favorite activity: jumping off the couch onto pillows. He could do that for hours.

Favorite word: "NO!" Then maybe "oops!" which he says as "Eups!" It's cute.

Favorite animal: Animals. Bugs included.

Favorite past-time: playing in water. Wherever he can find it. I don't think he's discovered the potty water yet. We'll keep our fingers crossed. Well, he did stick toys in it once, but I think I freaked out so much I scared him from doing it again. We'll keep our fingers double-crossed.

All together he is a smart (he's started counting to 10, and gets it all right except he keeps forgetting "2", he's also picking up colors and shapes), adorable (his little voice and those big brown eyes and one dimple on his left cheek, how can you resist?), active (scooter-riding, ladder-climbing, couch-jumping, and anything else he can think of), cuddly (for a limited amount of time, but if he can hold your fingers and suck his thumb, he'll be pretty docile for a while) and just the cutest two year old in the world, even with the tantrums and wanting to do things himself and automatically answering "no!" even when he means "yes"! We love you, bug!