Why I love our same 10 meals

Story of my domestic attempts summed up in one flow chart.

(taken from xkcd [caution - comic language may not always be family friendly] )

Why I Love Southwest

1. Nonstop flights to Buffalo to Phoenix
2. Free checked bags
3. You can change your flights after booking for no extra fee! That means, if your mom decides to take the whole family to Disneyland after you've already booked your flights, you can change them without extra fees! SO excited.
4. Prices are done 1 leg at a time instead of paying 3/4 of the whole fare price for just 1 leg, like with many airlines. That means I can fly from Buffalo to Phoenix, Phoenix to LA (disneyland!), LA to San Fransisco (meet up with my dad's family), and San Fransisco to Buffalo without it being a huge mess. I do predict I will be "randomly selected" to be searched with all of these one way flights, though!

I have officially registered myself and both my kids for Rapid Rewards accounts so we can start saving up for FREE flights in the future. Hooray!

With fronds like these, who needs anemones?

Dan is finally home from his 8 day visit to San Fransisco! It is always hard being a single mom for that long. Hard to not be lonely, hard to maintain patience with the kids 24/7, and hard to get everything done. I was prepared for that. What I did not give enough forethought to, was how much I had scheduled for the week he was gone! Apparently my calendaring skills are not up to snuff. I had things going on most days and every single week night that he was gone! It simply would not have been possible without many wonderful friends. Thank you thank you.

My week may not look that busy, but when you add this to all the of the regular child care duties like dressing, bathing, teeth and hair brushing, feeding, cleaning, cooking, cleaning, playing, cleaning, reading, cleaning, bedtime, etc, it really adds up! Let me just say that I have not been staying up with my photo editing or getting the 9+ hours of sleep a night that this pregnant body has been demanding (any suggestions for insomnia during pregnancy?). So tired.

(help provided in italics)

Friday, Day #1:

•  Normal day, no help needed. Watched some of James' friends in the evening

Saturday, Day #2:

• Eric C watched my kids from 8-9am so I could still get in my long run for the week with his wife Katie and other friend Rebe. 
• Rebe loaned me the whole Twilight series for while Dan was gone. 
• Eric and Katie monitored Ruth while she napped so I could make a much needed trip to Joann's without the little girl who melts down at the very sight of a fabric store.
• Caught some sales at the mall and got out of the house! Kids were ok if you don't count the 3 times I had to pick up piles of intentionally spilled crackers. Could have been worse.
• Watched neighbor kids at night.

Sunday,  Day #3:

• Chris and Kira invited us over for brunch. They had to cancel due to illness, but they still get credit for the thought :)
• Church and stuff

Monday, Day #4:

• Lots of cleaning and photo editing.
• Eric and Katie had us over for dinner and family home evening. 
• Exercise class that night in the community room (part of my Graduate Community Assistant gig).

Tuesday, Day #5:

• Eric monitors my kids while they sleep in the morning and Katie lets us do a shorter run so I can still go.
• More cleaning and preparation for an activity I was running at the book fair family night at James' school (I basically made magnetic puppet shows for the kids to reenact Goldilocks and the Three Bears and the Gingerbread Man).
• Attended part of  Creativity Class (another GCA thing), but had to leave early for the book fair.
• Haley watches Ruth while I take James to the book fair, so I can actually run my activity. Ruth is very clingy in those types of situations.
• Ortons loan me their smaller whiteboard (and even bring it out to my car) so I do not have to try to coordinate the transportation of my classroom sized board without Dan there.

Wednesday, Day #6:

• Major grocery shopping trip to buy things for the next three night's activities. Ruth was not exactly a cooperative shopper. There were definitely tears involved.
• Katie watched Ruth while James was at preschool so I could volunteer at the book fair (I could have watcher her kids while she went, but she kindly let me do it so I could have a break)
• Dani watched the kids while I prepared my house for hosting book club that night.
• I offered to pay a neighborhood boy, Isaac, to deliver fliers for my GCA job since Dan normally does it and I had no idea how I would be able to. He ended up with strep, so his mom, Kim, took his little sister around to do it so I wouldn't have to. So nice.
• Made a yummy fruit pizza for book club, and everything went smoothly. Almost finished cleaning my house in time, but it was good enough.

Thursday, Day #7:

• Eric monitored the kids while Katie and I ran again.
• Set-up and attended story time (another GCA thing)
• Made a nursing cover for that night's baby shower during Ruth's nap. From beginning to end, including clean-up plus some extra house cleaning before I had to pick up James.
• Spent an hour and a half cleaning up poop.
• Dipped chocolate strawberries and went to baby shower.

Friday, Day #8:

• Played with kids and started chopping food for the fondue night (another GCA activity)
• MaryAnne watched my kids for 2 hours while I finished making fondue and chopping fruit, cake, etc for the activity.
• Katie made one of my fondue recipes for me (even though she wasn't going to be able to attend the event) and Eric delivered it to the community room to save me yet another trip back and forth.
• Celeste picked up my kids from MaryAnne and brought them back to my house. She played with them while I made trips back and forth to the community room and got the room set-up. She then put them to bed for me. 
• Finally finished fondue night, cleaned up, got home, and found Ruth with a poopy diaper and poop down her leg. I started changing her and both kids were now wide awake. Right then, Dan called saying his flight had landed.
• Tyler picked Dan up from the airport. Joe had also been willing, although my planning was so disjointed it ended up being Tyler. 

Thank you thank you again to everyone who helped out, I was truly humbled and touched by so many people being willing to help me out. Especially when the craziness was self-inflicted. I am truly blessed to have such great friends and neighbors! If I forgot a way that you helped me while Dan was gone, please know I appreciate you too!

Oh, and thank you Amberly and Beau for watching our kids on Saturday after Dan got back so we could go out!

Apology Accepted

Dear Sweet Ruthie,

Someday you will be old enough to understand why and how to apologize. Today is not that day.

Today, you do not realize the severity of smearing poop over your naked body from head to toe, part of your bedspread, a 5 foot stretch of your carpet, your dresser, your door, and your clothes.

Today, a day with nearly every moment planned out in advance, you do not have the words or the cognitive ability to sincerely apologize for the nearly hour and a half I spent scrubbing you, the carpet, your bedspread, the wall and door, your dresser, your clothes, the bathroom (which took a hit during the clean-up), you again, and finally myself.

No, not today. But I will immortalize the experience here so that someday, when you have the ability, you can apologize. And, of course, I will have had years to get over it and for the carpet to stop stinking, so I will accept. I am sure by that time I will be seeking your forgiveness for a list of offenses as well.

So...apology accepted...someday.

Love,

Mommy

Bookworm

Suddenly he can't get enough reading. He even reads until he falls asleep at night, or until I make him turn off the light. Love of recreational reading is not a trait he got from his dad, but we're all reading more this year as a goal. Three cheers for literacy!
Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

Triumph!

Ruth's potty training has been really sporadic. Today, however, she went all day with no accidents without me ever having to put her on the potty! She told me when she had to go every time. Hooray! I am sure there will be many discouraging days in my future, but there's a light!

Did I mention Ruth was weaned from her binky 2 weeks ago? It has really helped her get back on track with her night time sleep. Thank goodness!!!! I know  it is weird, but I feel really proud of her for making such big changes in her life so well. She really really loved her binky and we all know potty training is tough, plus she is doing them at the same time! My tough little girl.

Some funny potty training stories:

1. One day I was upstairs and Ruth said she had to go potty but wanted to go downstairs. She came back up and I saw something brown on her hands. Hoping she had helped herself to a cookie for going in the potty, I asked if she went poop in the potty. "No, I went poop on the carpet, but I put it in the potty!" Sure enough, she had trouble landing on the toilet (she's over that now, finally) and pooped a few inches from the toilet and then smeared it all over the place trying to get it back in.

2. Ruth likes to look at her poop and tell us what it looks like. Some examples are a snail, a ball, and an A. And I swear to you, it really looked just like a capital A. No kidding. That's early literacy my friends.

3. She frequently jokes that she wants to eat her poop. Thankfully that is the end of the story. Knock on wood.

4. For awhile we knew when Ruth had to go potty because she would say, "I want a cookie". Same thing. We can also tell when she's had an accident or gone in her diaper when not wearing underwear when she spontaneously starts talking about Kango (where she gets to go when she gets enough stars).

I'm sure there are others, but I can't think of them....Other than that whole peeing on my lap thing from last week.

What's next?

So I mentioned the kids playing for a long time in their rooms together. Some days it is just "organizing" books, some days it has been completely stripping their beds (we're trying to avoid that), and yesterday it was lining up every toothbrushing item they could find on the slats under the top bunk. They managed to fill 12 out of the 13 slats with toothbrushes, toothpaste, and toothpaste tube lids.

(from the other end)

I hope I don't find toothpaste all over in the morning...hmmm....maybe I shouldn't have left it there....

What could have been

Ruth let me use hair products, blow dry, and flat iron her hair the other day. Look how cute that is from the back/side!

I couldn't help but wonder what could have been if it weren't for the hack job. I was so avoiding bangs. You can tell as much in this picture but on Ruth's left side there is just a huge chunk of short hair. As soon as the hair band came out (about 40 minutes later) all the shagginess was very apparent.

Although, big brother hair cut or not, her naps would probably have destroyed it just like it does now :)

This year's ornament

So I didn't finish this year's ornament until the week after Christmas, but hey, I do what I can. For any who don't remember, we make homemade ornaments each year to represent the most significant event(s) of the year instead.

This year, as you can see in the out of focus photo below, is a combination of the 3 biggest events from our year. Starting my photography business (camera), going camping a lot this Summer (leaf), and Dan getting images from his laser microscope thingy he's been building (he uses microscopic green beads to test the microscope). Happy 2010!


In order wedding glass and honeymoon shells, James' baby anklet, tassle from when Dan and I both graduated (BS and MS, respectively), Ruth's anklet and Hawaii necklace, prelim fail/pass letters and some other icons from our many events, and 2010!

Farewell

In December we said good-bye to some of our best friends in Rochester. That seems to come with the territory of being students, but they were so tantalizingly close to becoming permanent Rochester residents on several ocassions that we allowed ourselves to feel optimistic. They moved here at the same time we did and we have children the same age. We have spent countless hours hanging out, mostly playing games. They are solely responsible for turning us into game people. We will really miss having them here (even Dan was all teary as we said good-bye), but wish them the best in Utah and wherever they end up next!

Best pals and partners in crime (did I ever mention the pee pee and poo poo party in James' bedroom?)

I will miss Charity's great friendship and example. Rochester will not be the same for us without you!

On their last day here, we had Enoch over for the day and took him to the museum so he and James could say good-bye. I don't think they really understood the finality. That night we had another family over and treated the Bates to Dinosaur BBQ take-out (Jordan's favorite) and spent the evening chatting while the kids watched a movie. All we needed was a vicious game of Settlers and it wouldn't have felt any different than our other gatherings! We love you guys!

A few fun things from our week so far...

• James swam by himself with no floaties at preschool for the first time!
• I heard baby #3's heartbeat at my first Dr's appointment yesterday. Official due date: August 17th
• Monday night we all went sledding at a nearby park with much bigger hills than our neighborhood. We all had a really really fun time, except Ruth. Sadly, when we arrived at the park, we realized her inflatable sled had a big whole in it. James' flat saucer sled was too difficult for her to feel secure on, so she spent most the time watching. We were really glad Dan took off work a little early to make this happen (the sun set at 4:45 that day!)
• James and Ruth played in their room together for close to 2 hours today! They were playing library to put their books away (they are at least in a pile by the shelf now) and making their beds (I haven't checked to see if this was ever finished, but it was their idea not mine). Now they are playing in the basement.
• The snow has started! We got a lot last night and it is expected to keep coming for the next few days. It should complicate my morning run tomorrow, but I am excited for more snow for the kids to play in.
• Not just from this week, but a random thing that cracks me up about Ruth recently. She can effectively tuck herself into bed. I will go into her room when she is asleep and find her blanket smooth and in place all the way up  to her chin. I think to myself, "wow! She went to sleep without even wiggling around in her bed". Then she wakes up and I notice a pile of books under her blanket (which wasn't there before) and shoes on her feet that were in her drawer when I left her room. Silly girl.

Hope you're having a great week!

The Importance of Play

This article was forwarded to me by the director of James' preschool. His preschool is very play-based which I love. This is also very in sync with my Master's program.

Our world is so focused on children's achievement, that we forget that so many skills that children need to learn at a young age are learned through play. The best reminder for me in this article is that the definition of play is that it is "initiated and directed by children". That means that video games or toys that work by the push of a button with no imagination are not really requiring children to play. It is also not play when I impatiently direct our fort building or dollhouse script because I don't want to keep knocking things down, etc.

One advantage of this child-directed play, as the article points out, is that it allows children to learn how to structure and follow their own activities. It was observed that children used to organize their own kick ball games without any help from an adult and they modified the rules as necessary. This is unlike little league teams that provide so much structure that children do not need to think for themselves or adapt at all. So while most 3 year-old know how to scroll through iphone apps on their parents phone, most 7 year-olds today are unable to organize an outdoor game with other children.

Anyway, read it yourself and go play with your kids and create opportunities for your kids to play. I need to remember to be better about this!

2 Options

Ruthie has two potty training options when in public since she tends to get distracted and not tell me when she has to go. I can either 1) take her to the bathroom once an hour or 2) keep her in a diaper.

For church today I decided to go with option 2, which is convenient because I took her to church straight from her nap, which is the other time she wears a diaper.

Unless she wets her diaper before she falls asleep, in which case she takes it off.

Which apparently she did today, and I in my rush did not even notice since she had redressed herself.

Didn't notice of course, until I felt something warm all over my lap during Sacrament meeting and had to take a trip home to change my clothes. Ruth got to wear the jeans I've had in my purse for her all week and have never had to use.

Better than on the pew I guess.

Shout Out to James

Who today unloaded the dishwasher, vacuumed the basement steps, put lunch dishes in the dishwasher, ran upstairs to get dry underwear for Ruthie for me, got dressed before he even came out of his room this morning (something I suggested yesterday in passing), and overall was a very obedient boy. Just wanted to document this great day in your life, James!

Meanwhile, Ruthie screamed most of the morning, gave me a fat lip with a head butt, smeared yogurt on the couch I had just scrubbed, peed on the couch that I had just washed the yogurt off of, intentionally spilled milk on the table because she said she wanted to, made me cry tears of frustration, and in general was a real party pooper as James and I called her. She's really a sweetie, as long as we do whatever she wants and give her our undivided attention.

Thank you again, James for being my ray of sunshine on a gloomy day!

Family Heirloom

The thing about only having two children in a family is that both can have a reasonable expectation of getting something they loved  from their childhood. The problem comes when they both want the same thing!

Dan and Nicole are both very attached to a fabric advent calendar with daily ornaments in it that their mom made before she even had her first child! It is a really fun family tradition that our children now love too (although, I admit, I still bemoan the lack of chocolate in this variety of advent calendar!). Dan's mom helped me make a near replica of the calendar this year and the old one will be traveling to DC to join Nicole's household. 

We couldn't find all the same things, and I inadvertently spaced the pockets too much, but I think it turned out well. Dan, who insisted it be as close a replica as possible, seems pleased and James, who was reluctant to give away the calendar at first, seems to really like the new one too! Thank you, Andrea for doing most of the meticulous cutting (all the numbers and most of the gifts), which I am 100% sure would have been my least favorite part.

The original:

The "replica":

Some things I love right now

1. Having this map on our wall. The kids do this at least once a day, pointing to places on the map and asking what they are. James likes doing family home evening lessons that incorporate the map, like going through the temple Ensign edition and pointing to where the temples are on the map or when we talked about missionaries pointing to places where people we know have served.

 

2. My kids being friends. It just brightens up my day.

3. Ruthie's little bottom in underwear. Kids bottoms are so cute in little underwear, no longer bloated and puffy with diapers. She is not done potty training yet, but she has made great strides. She has even started telling me when she has to go usually at least half the time, although that percentage has been about 0 the couple of times I've taken her out of the house in underwear.

4. This clock. You set the time your children should go to bed and wake up and it turns blue when they are supposed to be sleeping (to look like a moon) and orange when they can wake up (to look like the sun). My kids understood right away and love watching for the color to change. James, our little rule follower, is a hard fast believer, Ruth sometimes needs some convincing (like in the middle of the night when she tells us "the clock is blue, that means stay in bed...while standing in our room). Fortunately, James does not shy from bossing his sister around and has been known to barricade her in the room if the clock is not orange! 

I am glad we learned how to dim the light, because I think it was so bright at first that it reinforced some night time waking habits Ruthie has been developing. We have now taken away the binky and are in sleep training mode (good thing James never wakes up when Ruthie cries in the night...seriously, she once cried for 3 hours straight and the next morning he had no idea). I thought we'd mastered this a long time ago! I think she has only slept through the night once or twice in the last 3 weeks! Hopefully now that the holidays are over and we will be in the same place for the next 6 weeks, she will be able to get back into the swing of things! Although during the night has been bad, my kids are cooperating with the wake up time on their clock being almost 1.5 hours later than they were getting up on their own! This has allowed this tired mommy some extra sleep on the 3 mornings a week I'm not sleeping and sometimes an extra 20 minutes after my run and shower!

5. My new running tights. They are making a big difference over my more bulky layers I was wearing before in the cold. I will still have to wear an extra layer when it gets back into the low 20s or teens again, but I love them. I also love having such a consistent and die hard running partner who is the only reason I've been able to keep running for so many consecutive months! Thanks, Katie!

There are so many other things that make me happy now, but one just got home from work early to eat before he leaves again, so I'm going to cut this short!

Resolutions

I believe in very detailed goals, but I will spare you all the details and just give you the basics.
 
1. Be more dedicated to my calling (budget coaching for needy in my ward)
2. Structure my daily schedule better
3. Gain no more than 25lbs by August 17th (give or take)
4. Lose 25lbs between August 17th and December 31st
5. Improve my photography.

My goal for Ruthie is to finish potty training. She's getting close!

For James, learn to ride a bike (and in general do other physical activities) without being so scared. Maybe even ride without training wheels.

For Dan, finish his dissertation proposal. Hopefully that will be finished in the first 1/4 of the year, but you never can tell.