back to life

It's amazing what a weight is lifted with Enrichment being over (if that wasn't a grammatically mauled sentence, I don't know what is). I found it ironic that I was so worn out by a night designed to be relaxing and a spiritual well-filler (we had classes on refilling spiritual wells, using humor to uplift, and physical relaxation techniques, as well as making lavender and wheat hot packs and lavender and eucalpytus bath salts, plus tables full of veggies, crackers, and dippables for the chocolate fountains). After helping everyone else to relax, I had to roll my windows down on the way home to stay awake.

But then this morning I hopped out of bed, enjoyed a lovely breakfast & scripture time with my family, ran a couple miles, and had a productive phone meeting with a client. I feel alive again. And creative. And more like me.

On a side note, we had a really yummy (unplanned, because I was so exhausted I just...gave up) dinner last night: fresh tortillas (2 c. flour, 1 t. baking powder, 1/2 t. salt, 2 T. olive oil, 1/2 c. or so warm water, mix together, divide into 10 balls, roll out, fry on ungreased skillet for about 30 s. per side) rolled up around black beans, teeny chunks of pineapple, a squeeze of lime juice, a shake of cayenne pepper, plus fresh lettuce and cilantro from the garden. Absolutely divine.

woe is me

it's been one of "those" days. no, scratch that...weeks. a combination of exhaustion (despite going to bed at 9:30 last night, I started crying when I heard Juliet crying this morning at 6:50 because I was still so tired), insane busy craziness (enrichment is tonight, which means lots of stress all week), and general feelings of parental inadequacy (exacerbated by comments like "I don't want you to be my mommy, I just want to keep Juliet and Daddy").

Yesterday I really went out of my way to try to give Abigail a fun day. She had a friend over for several hours in the morning, then after her swimming lesson, we had a picnic lunch at the gazebo by the pool with two of her friends (and their mothers). Then we went swimming for two hours. This was quite an undertaking, since we were basically at the pool for four hours, missed Abigail's nap (and had to coax Juliet to sleep in her stroller, which entailed walking around the kiddie pool for about half an hour). Plus if you have small children, you know that getting them to eat anything where they're not strapped into their chairs is especially hard, doubly so if there's a playground nearby (and triply so if small child is nursing).

Anyway, I was pretty drained by the end of the day, but I thought, "Well, at least Abigail's had the time of her life. She's been splashing and giggling and laughing all day...I know she had so much fun, even if it was hard for me."

Hah.

We got in the car, and she began wailing, "Oh Mommy, I want to go home! You said we will stay at the pool and play with friends, and I just wanted to go home and sleep in my bed! You are so mean taking me to the pool with friends and the playground and the picnic! So mean! I just want to be at home, not at the pool and the playground! Take me home! Now! You are just a mean, mean, mean mommy!"

Cue wallowing in self-pity.

emergency essentials

How to Rotate Your Food Storage

by Juliet

Step 1: Begin with a sunny evening, a number-ten can of chocolate pudding mix, a big sheet of paper, a kiddie pool, and two adults.

Step 2: Mix up one batch of pudding and plunk it down on the paper. Add children.



Step 3: Stand back. Well back.



Step 4: Be forewarned that if you're not getting in on the fun, I, Juliet, will do my best to do it for you.



Step 5: Just enjoy the melee.



Step 6: Transfer children to kiddie pool (this portion's pictures edited due to fact that both children were sans clothes. Rest assured, however, that a great deal of splashing ensued, and at one point, oldest child jumped out of the pool, retrieved the bowl of pudding, and both children ate it in fistfuls while sitting in the pool. Then they washed the bowl quite thoroughly in the pool).

Step 7: You may need a hose. And definitely a warm bath afterwards. That is, if your children had as much fun as Miss Juliet did.



Step 8: Enjoy a very quiet evening with your husband, because your worn-out children will sleep soundly like this (although perhaps they may not share Abigail's aversion to any form of clothing whatsoever in the summer months):

it's officially summer...

Yesterday was Abigail's first day of swimming lessons. She's been really excited for this, especially since she's in a class with her good friends Elise and Mia.

(For reference in the pictures, Abigail is in the green striped suit with the flamingo.)

Swimming like an alligator...

Bored with the alligator circuit of the pool, she lures Elise away to giggle on the side...

Of course, since it was the first day, they were only in the water for a few minutes (after reading all the rules) so it was somewhat of a battle to get her to leave. So I blew up the kiddie pool (aah! Lightheadedness!) when we got home and let the water warm up while the girls napped.





My favorite thing about watching Jules in water is watching her fat little legs float up and unbalance her. She's constantly battling to keep her backside firmly planted on the bottom.

hodge podge

Things from the weekend, which overall was very mixed:

Our garden is doing things! We've had lettuces for almost a month now, and yesterday we spotted the first florets of broccoli forming in the huge bushy broccoli leaves. Hurray! We've been having fun watching the beans pop out of the ground, the tomatoes and peppers stretch out and (finally) start to grow, the squash, zucchini, and cucumbers are finally leafing out, the carrots are getting all ferny and fun, the leeks are finally standing up straight, and the onions and cilantro are doing their best to take over the garden. And no, I'm really not kidding about the cilantro. All the other baby herbs are still tiny and tender and peeking out--the cilantro is EVERYWHERE. And it's big. I like to just pull off leaves and eat them while I weed. All the rain is doin' our garden good (and the weeds too, unfortunately).

Neil and I had one of the best dates ever Friday night: we played raquetball and then went swimming. It was SO fun and a great workout. I always love dates like this because they remind me why I married Neil and how much fun he is.

Which is good, because Saturday was pretty lousy--Neil went in to the lab in the morning and then spent the afternoon doing more research while I worked on an editing project and the kids napped. And it rained a LOT and the potage parmentier I made for dinner was not as blissful as I was hoping--mostly it just tasted like wet leeks. Then we had to weed the garden when the kids went to bed, and they both kicked up a fuss, so it took forever to get them to bed and we got out to the garden the same time the mosquitoes did.

So we popped a HUGE bowl of popcorn and stayed up until 2 am watching movies. That was fun.

Then Sunday morning Neil sneaked the kids out of our room after I fed Jules and let me sleep in until TEN. And he brought me breakfast in bed. Oh, I love that man. And it was especially nice because Abigail was, well, um...acting like a three-year-old all day, and I really needed that morning loveliness to make it through the day.

Speaking of Abigail, this morning she was sitting on the floor watching us get ready, and said approvingly, "Oh Mommy, I like your skirt. It is very beautiful and long. I really like it a lot. I like how it has lines on it. It's very beautiful." Then she looked over at Neil, who was wearing a towel around his waist while he shaved, scrunched up her little face, and said, "Um...Daddy, I like your skirt too. It is nice."

Sometimes it's hard on Neil living with three girls. Sometimes he starts to cave in to all the pink floofies surrounding him. Not only did I find him reading Gone with the Wind this weekend, but he stole my new issue of Martha Stewart Living (he says it was just to read the barbeque recipes...)



Then he has to act all manly and throws rocks at rabbits, just to show us he's not into princesses and the like. Something like that.

Today while we were cooking dinner I asked Neil what food he associates with me, and he said bread.

I like bread.

I like it a lot.



Juliet is ten months old, as of Saturday. This morning Neil looked at her and said, "She looks so old! She doesn't look like a baby anymore! Look at her shoes--those are little girl feet!"

And sure enough...they're turning into little girl feet.



Fat, chubby, and eminently kissable little feet.

Funniest Porta Potty Prank

Start off your morning with some serious laughs! Thanks, Autumn, for sharing this!

Funniest Porta Potty Prank

Jammin' out

Last night we let Abigail stay up three hours past her bedtime to make the first batch of this year's jam with us. You see, while I'm fairly strict about bedtimes on the day-to-day, Abigail is a sufficiently adaptable child that I've been known to zoom around the rules every so often (like waking her up at 10 pm to eat a hot-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookie). When she was a little baby I would sneak into her room all the time and bring her out so I could cuddle her, although sometimes I had to be evasive about it because Neil wasn't exactly a supporter of the "disrupt the sleep schedule" way of thinking.

Juliet's another story--we don't mess with that kid at bedtime. Little Miss Clock is a well-regulated child who will go to sleep easily once per night. You wake her up, your night is shot.

Anyway, last night as I was pushing Abigail on the swings at 10:11 (and hoping nobody noticed that she was wearing nothing but underwear and LOTS of jam) while we waited for Neil to get back with the extra pectin, I thought about how sometimes these are the moments that make motherhood really worthwhile--out in the dark with my sticky little pumpkin, pointing out the stars and talking about the moon and how it feels at nighttime.

Okay, on to the pictures, since that's what you're really reading for. And let me note, I think jam-making is very kid-friendly, as long as you don't mind cleaning up the mess afterwards. We had a blast!

First, we washed and hulled a lot of strawberries.



Abigail tried to eat them as fast as they were hulled. She called it "helping" (which was also what she did while we were at the strawberry field. Let's just say I insisted on paying extra for all the ones she ate).



Then we washed them all over again. Abigail was our go-to girl for this part.



Then (my favorite) we smashed them up. Abigail was a little dubious at first.

Then she started to really enjoy herself.

Then she sort of went crazy. Let's just say it's a good thing we decided to paint the kitchen red.

Then we measured everything out (40 cups of sugar...whee!), Neil went to Walmart when I realized that I hadn't counted pectin beforehand and we were multiplying the recipe by 10 and needed 3 more boxes of pectin...when will I learn? I ALWAYS have to make a middle-of-the-process run at some point when we do jam!

Anyway. Our macerated strawberries, sugar, lemon juice, and pectin all combined to produce this loveliness...

...and Abigail began to help clean up...

...and sort of got side-tracked.

When we were finishing the dishes, we looked over and realized that she was sitting on the floor licking jam off her toes.

I can't even tell you how much fun we had.

And now if you'll excuse me, there's a princess dress-clad kid ready to mash berries with me. See ya!

killing time

A picture from the Abigail archives--11 months old

I made the mistake of leaving my book in Juliet's room when I put her down for a nap, so I can't reward myself for finishing an editing project by reading. So since I'm at the computer (because I finished editing)...I will blog.

I don't really have anything to say. So how 'bout a snapshot...want to know what we did today?

We got up. And fell over Abigail because she was asleep next to our bed. Who knows when she came in. We had broken clouds again last night, needless to say.

We ate breakfast (Special K, because Thursday is cold cereal day). We read scriptures (Alma chapter 23). We had family prayer. Neil went to work. I cleaned the 'fridge in preparation for grocery shopping later.

The girls and I went on a quick walk around the block (4/10 of a mile), because lately Abigail has complained about her side hurting when we walk, so I'm trying to build up her endurance. Abigail and I had a nice little chat about the fun things we will do in Utah this summer and about how she learned to go up stairs when she was a baby. She loves hearing stories about herself, and it's fun to relive those moments with her.

Juliet went down for a nap, so Abigail and I read a quick story and then I worked for an hour while Abigail flopped around on my bed reading stories to her dollies. Then I read her some more stories with Jules flopping around all over the place. Then I fed Jules. Then I vacuumed the house while the kids followed me around pulling toys out.

Abigail and Juliet played an elaborate game involving my strength-training bands while I cleared out the file folders in the desk (Thursday's organizing is "focus on master bedroom" day, which is where the desk happens to be). We sang along to Wicked while we threw things away.

The girls ate lunch (macaroni and cheese, because we need to go grocery shopping and we're out of things like apples, mozarella, peaches, rye bread, and carrots, which is what we normally eat) while I made baguettes (to eat with our pasta primavera tonight) and talked to my mom on the phone. Then we cleaned up, read some more stories, and everyone but me went down for naps. I worked on an editing project for a couple of hours.

Then I blogged.

Now I'm going to go eat some crispy hot baguettes--but I'm keeping one nice and warm and uncut so Abigail can listen to the bubbles pop inside--make my grocery list, and daydream about this evening's strawberry-picking jaunt. Which means I'll be up all night making jam! Hurrah!

thinking

Yesterday was another tornado watch day, which means that I spent two hours rubbing Abigail's back in the afternoon while it thundered, and then we spent more time in the middle of the night with a small shaking blond fluffball in our bed (fortunately around 3 am she consented to sleep on a mattress next to our bed, so we all got some sleep. It was a long night. At one point I was so groggy and desperate to get back to sleep that when Abigail shrieked in terror at the incessant--literally, it sounded like a train was going by with NO breaks between the thunder--boomings, I said something like, "Oh, Abigail, it's just teeny little nice fairies in the sky dropping things and sometimes they break! It's just nice tiny little sparkly fairies!" and then this morning Neil was like, "What the heck were you babbling about with the fairies in the middle of the night?" Oh well).

Anyway, it was a perfect day today to have my darling visiting teachers come, because we got to chat for two hours while our children all ran around and wore themselves out in Abigail's room and us thunder-sleep-deprived mommies didn't have to do any child-wrangling. And it was fabulous because they graciously helped me cut out fabric for wheat and lavender heat packs (for Enrichment next week). I just love them.

One of the things we were discussing today (since both my visiting teachers are currently in grad school--one is getting her master's in financial planning and the other is doing a doctorate in family studies--aren't they awesome? especially with children!) is some of the emotional difficulty that comes with working to educate oneself and then making the transition to motherhood, where one may or may not be home all the time, working, using one's education directly, not using it so directly, etc. We talked a lot about perpetual education and about working to receive as much formal education as possible. It was an interesting discussion, and one I really needed. It's a real blessing to have visiting teachers who are dealing with the same things I'm working to understand and figure out in my own life. And it's great to have visiting teachers who have become real friends.

flood of pictures

My picture-less posts are on hiatus--with a vengeance. Here's a nice lengthy compilation instead (G'ma and Papa, you may want to just look at these instead of printing them, or you may need a new ink cartridge!)

A typical afternoon activity around here: coloring. Sometimes on paper, sometimes on the floor and 'fridge. Or sometimes they just eat the crayons, much to my dismay (when I picked Juliet up to nurse her after taking this picture, I fished most of a chartreuse crayon out of her mouth. In very small pieces).


I just really liked the composition of this picture. It's a good "Juliet shot"--fighting against the system. In this case, sunhats. And you can see her beloved bunny next to her and her "shaker," which she also loves (an old spice container with a few lentils inside. Great noise!)



This is probably my favorite of the pictures we took at the park the other day.



This isn't a particularly good picture of either of us (talk about helmet hair!), but it always amazes me when I don't wear heels and I realize how much bigger Neil is than I am. And I like it because it makes me feel all dainty and feminine. Even if I just look sort of dazed in the picture.




My pink little Jules.

Abigail and Neil hiding at the top of the twirly slide, which they previously climbed up, breaking all known playground rules. That kid's going to have a rough intro to kindergarten recess rules.

I debated over putting this picture online, but obviously...I did. It really typifies Abigail these days--practical (it's very hot, so no clothes!) and yet still managing to dress up. Oh, and dancing, of course.

Watermelon fest!

Sometimes it's hard getting Jules and Abigail to eat dinner, because they just start laughing at each other. Very. Loudly.

Abigail was in time-out for bonking Juliet on the head. But she got bored. So she lured Juliet into time-out with her (and yes, instead of enforcing rules, I hid behind the door and took pictures).

And then once Jules joined her in time-out, Abigail kissed her better where she'd bonked her. So I was glad I'd stayed in hiding.

One thing we've been working on a lot with Abigail is ladylike behavior. Case in point: here she is "sitting like a liddle lady," as she would say.

And of course, every "liddle lady" needs to throw off her inhibitions every now and then.

baguettes

Today we biked to the playground and had a picnic for lunch (pictures from that later). And then we all came home and slept for a long time. And woke up with plenty of energy and ravenously hungry.

So we transformed our kitchen into a bistro and had a salad of mesclun and spinach (picked from the garden before dinner), grilled sirloin, sauteed asparagus, watermelon, and fresh baguettes for dinner.

Oh, the baguettes.

They're so decadent. And so delightfully within your grasp.

If you have flour, salt, yeast, and water, you should go make these now. Start a movie, and by the time it's over, you'll be eating delicious baguette, and you will have only done about ten minutes of actual "work."

I cannot even tell you how much I love bread. Mmm....bread. And baguettes top it all. When I was eating dinner tonight I closed my eyes and pretended I was back in Paris (except without the frites).

funny

Today when I came home from the book sale at the library I dumped a shower of books into Abigail's lap. She flipped through them, then looked up at me with me a big smile and said brightly, "Mommy, I am very pride of you! I am very happy with this pile!"

Another great Abigailism--her prayer(s) last night: "Thank you that the rain and the funder and all the broken clouds can please go away and I can sleep in Mommy and Daddy's bed and they will keep me safe from the broken clouds that are scary."

Speaking of book sales...how over the moon am I at the fact that I scored the Williams-Sonoma Bread Book and a vintage edition of From Julia Child's Kitchen for $2 each?!

I stand corrected

Here's what's worse than a sick kid on date night:

Taking one sick kid with you to the mall while the other one goes to date night babysitting.

Then the mall locks down because a tornado has touched down in the western half of the city...which is where your child is.

Also, your neighborhood's main street is nicknamed "Tornado Alley."

Also, you have no cell phone. Not that you could hear anything over the sirens anyway.

And the stoplights are out as you drive home (the tornado warning is now just a watch) and there's a LOT of water on the road and dumping down on you. Oh, and there's so much water dumping down that it's shorting out things in your engine for the first few minutes of the drive and the car keeps dying.

Fortunately all is well, and because everyone is a bit edgy, an unofficial family party ensues when you get home. Popcorn and chocolate cookies and perhaps a princess movie. And some serious thank-you prayers.

few things depress me as much as sick children on date night.

especially when date night is a rotating babysitting thing--you still watch the other people's kids. just no date for you because your kids got sick on a night you were supposed to have a date.

my children eat grass

For some reason I haven't been taking very many pictures lately, but this one from last year basically covers my bases this week: we're spending a lot of time outside beheading clover. Except this year instead of Abigail clipping off clover blossoms with needle-nose pliers, Juliet pops them off and stuffs them in her mouth. And then she goes crazy when I take them away and crawls off the blanket and defiantly stuffs a whole handful in her mouth. Is it possible for babies to be allergic to clover? Is that why she was running a fever last night, occasioning a frantic doctor visit this morning? (or was it, perhaps, that she missed the doctor's office, not having been there for almost two whole weeks? Is it just me, or are my children sick ALL THE TIME this year?!)

In any case, while Juliet slept the sleep of the well-drugged child this morning (we love Tylenol and Dimetapp), Abigail and I mucked about in the garden. Yesterday while I was planting more veggies (and while the girls were being blown about in their sun tent) I noticed things were looking a bit weedy, so we attacked the weeds this morning. Correction: I weeded. Abigail plucked out three weeds, then began collecting pebbles (also a great garden endeavor). Then she decided she'd had enough manual labor and told me she was leaving.

To be precise, she told me she was leaving for Mexico to swim with the dolphins. So she drove her little car across the yard to the gas station, sang a happy little song while she filled up her tank (with clover, natch), and then trundled around the yard commenting on the dolphins and sharks she waas driving by. Then she came back over to where I was busily weeding away at the lettuce and onions, wrapped her arms around me, and asked if I would please come to Mexico with her. Then she ran off again, enticed by the crimson promises of the strawberry bed. Oh, how I love that child.

Speaking of my funny Abigail, she always likes to know what's on the docket for the day. I didn't realize how I always end the rundown with the same phrase until today she said, "Mommy, I think we will change Juliet's diaper and then read some stories and then take naps and then we'll go to date night. Ok? Does that sounds like a good plan to you?"

replenishing the soul

Today I have a reading hangover.

Yesterday I read four books (about 1300 pages). I don't know how I found time to do it in between running a house and mothering all day.

Oh wait. I remember. I didn't go to bed until 1:30 am (fully aware that Juliet would be up at 6:30).

Sometimes I overindulge.

But on another note, something I've been thinking about for awhile is taking time out for oneself (partially because this is the theme of our enrichment in a couple of weeks). What do you do that replenishes your soul, whether you're single, married, working, home with kids all day, male or female?

Mostly I read or exercise. Or I go to the library (by myself!!!) to find more books. Or I go running by myself. Lately I've been thinking about signing up for classes in something to further develop myself in a way that does not involve reading or running (especially on days when my calves hurt from running and my back hurts from reading in a crunched-up position). Classes like ballet (I haven't taken a dance class for about four years) or pottery or oil painting, all of which are taught at our local community center. Hmm.

What do you do to center yourself?

the perks of three-year-olds

Ways for a child to melt the mother heart:

Comment that said mother is wearing her pajama pants backward (not on purpose, I assure you).

Mother asks child to get dressed.

Child returns to kitchen and proudly announces, "Look, Mommy! My pants are backward today, just like you! We match!"

I'm sure enjoying this stage of "Mommy is cool" versus "Mom, your pants look dumb." I love my adoring little three-year-old.

I really should blog about the weekend (family in town over the holiday weekend) which was fun and delightful, but I'm a little tired and lazy and so I won't. Plus most of those of you who would be interested were here anyway. :-) And also I didn't even turn on my camera the entire weekend because I was too busy enjoying my family (although maybe they could email me some pictures?)

I don't really have anything especially exciting to blog about, other than to note that I've really enjoyed the last couple of days of really doing...nothing. The last few weeks I've been trying to be fairly low-key (since the semester ended) and just do little things with the girls that are fun and not necessarily a huge outing.

So yesterday and today we've been enjoying popsicles and crackers outside on a blanket while we read stories, biking to the playground (except if I'd thought beforehand about biking against strong winds for 7 miles while pulling 80 pounds of children and bike trailer we might not have gone after all), splashing around in the bathtub, and making good use of the new paints given to the girls by their grandpa this weekend.

That's all. And it's been enough.

snapshot

Yesterday at 5:28 p.m., this is what we were doing:

Rachael: chopping veggies from last year's garden (sun-dried tomatoes and roasted peppers) to make a sauce for tortellini

Neil: edging the lawn

Abigail: tucked up in the "princess castle" reading Fancy Nancy, which is one of our favorite books these days







Juliet: wishing she was outside with Abigail