The Olympics and Lost Keys

Watching the Olympics makes me want to get back in shape and maybe do a half-marathon again this fall, since it didn't work out in the spring.

It also inspired the girls to work on their physical prowess. These are some pictures Mike took when he was in charge of bedtime. Note, the girls are not sleeping, they are practicing their diving moves off of their beds. I'm guessing Kate started this. (I think his flash is what makes the walls look much more vibrant than usual.)

Today, I took the girls to the track and let them play and push Emy around while I ran a few laps. We didn't have a lot of time as I was headed to my first hair appointment in, well, a long time. (Nearly a year...) So, immediately after my last lap I got ready to shuttle the girls to the car as quickly as possible. Except...

"Where are the keys?" I asked, not finding them in the stroller where I had placed them.

"In there," Kate replied, matter-of-factly, pointing to the sand pit.

My stomach lurched a little as I started to desperately rake my fingers through the sand pit. I had left my cell phone home as I had planned to be so quick; I had visions of having to walk home with my crew and somehow find someone with a metal detector. (I don't like to let it out too often, but I have a dramatic side.)

After ten minutes of searching and a few mini-lectures on not playing with keys, I heard the words I'd been waiting for.

"I found them Mommy!"

"You saved the day, Maggie!"

"My kids buried my keys in the sand pit," I explained as I sat down for my hair cut.

I never had a better excuse for being late.

The Verdict Is Still Out

Some of my favorite moments are when I am declared to be the "best mom ever" by my own. It happens fairly frequently.

For instance, one day, a couple weeks ago, Kate was napping and I was nursing Emily when I heard a crash, then running, then crying. I rushed out, worried I might find injury, but found only a tear-faced Maggie with powdered sugar in her hair. After dusting some brownies and sending them off with salad and breadsticks in a joint meal effort for a fellow church member, I had not yet put away the powdered sugar. Now, a large amount of it was on the floor with an upside-down brownie pan.

Maggie tried to choke out her version of what happened between sobs. I tried to comfort her and forget the fact that I was about to spend a lot of time cleaning up powdered sugar.

"It's going to be okay, Maggie.  I know you didn't mean to.  I'll help you clean it up." Pause. "You know, it's actually kind of funny."

At that last reassurance, Maggie's tear-stained face popped up and a slow smile began to spread, "It is?" she said uncertainly.

I nodded. "It is. We all have spills like this once in a while."

"Did you spill powdered sugar everywhere when you were a kid trying to help your mom? It made me really happy when you said it was 'kind of funny.'"

Just like that, we were back to normal and I was again to deemed the "best mom ever." I deserved it. It really did take a long time to clean up that powdery white stuff.

Unfortunately, I am also often determined to be "not the best/nicest mom ever anymore." And I deserve that too. It's hard to live up to my reputation all the time.

Today, I wasn't the best. I yelled a couple times. (I did apologize, but why can't we let sleeping babies wake on their own around here, for crying out loud?) The house was a mess all day. Dinner wasn't even started when Mike got home. (Does it make it better I had a plan and it was yummy and fast?)

I wasn't the worst either. I painted some nails. Helped the girls ride their bikes. Did some dishes and laundry and vacuuming. Thankfully, no powdered sugar clean-ups. That would have sent me over the edge.

In my defense, my allergies are acting up, I am really tired, and I think I may have swimmer's ear.

So, the verdict is still out. I am choosing to remember the powdered sugar incident and am feeling pretty good about myself, since, at least sometimes, I'm "the best mom ever."

Nauvoo--Now and Then

Friday, we went to the Nauvoo pageant. I guess we've made it tradition to go each summer after we have a baby, as we started with Maggie and the Manti pageant. Two years ago we took baby Kate and saw my beautiful friend Tierra Jean portray Jane Manning in the Nauvoo pageant. She did it last year again and this year, only now her name is Tierra Jean Jones. It was fun to meet her husband, Bryson, who was representing Elijah Fordham.

We made it a day trip as we had obligations on Saturday. Bloopers including forgetting the freshly cooked bacon for our BLT dinner (sitting on the counter, neatly bagged in plastic) and Kate getting car sick (luckily, I caught it). But everything else went perfectly. Including pulling in at 4:30 am, safe and sound. The girls slept the whole way and somehow we managed to stay awake. But we will wait a while until our next all-nighter.

And below, the picture I never posted of our first Nauvoo adventure. The house in both pictures is a replica of the one that belonged to Mike's great-plus-grandma.

Other weekend highlights included a stake pool party, a shopping trip to Aldi's (my favorite no-frills grocery store), a really long birthday party, and a really easy sacrament meeting--thanks to a sweet twelve-year-old who was on loan to us to watch our girls when we went to sing with the choir. We didn't have to pull anyone out from under the pew. Yay! And Mike didn't have to help with the sacrament, so we didn't have echoes of "Daddy, Daddy" during that either. Kate did have a nosebleed out of the blue in nursery, poor girl. Totally freaked her out. How my girls still maintain a reputation of being calm is a mystery to me.

Something Like This

Yesterday went something like this.

I wake up at 7:23 to Maggie telling me she has a special breakfast ready for me. (Cereal.) Really tired. But excited to see I have just enough time to run. See that Maggie has set the table with bowls and spoons and a bowl of grapes for "celebration." "Decoration?" I ask. "Yep," is reply. So cute.

Help the girls get breakfast. Run out of time to run. Or shower without wondering what kids are up too. Have a vague idea of exercising and showering a bit later.

Decide to try to enter some photos I'd taken in the county fair. Make insincere attempt to get girls to make beds and get dressed.

Start looking through pictures trying to decide on entries. Do some minor editing and figure out more about Lightroom. Try to learn more about how to get better skin tones on some pics I took in JPG instead of RAW format. Wish I had more crisp images. Why am I such a perfectionist sometimes? Grr. I would be so much better at life if I were efficient instead.

Reschedule tentative visiting teaching appointment for the evening. Involves four phone calls.

Realize that time is going quickly and this is more complicated than I had hoped.

Girls keep getting into things because I'm being a bad mom and not keeping them occupied, i.e., took out all their plastic dishes and filled them with little people and blocks, put on some purple eyeshadow (don't judge me for having some, it was a sample), and drew on front hall tile with sidewalk chalk (it could have been worse).

Start to feel panicked and call Mike.

Wonder why I am trying to do this anyway. Kids tired and fighting. (Had trouble falling asleep the night before because Mom dared leave the house at bedtime to visit with college roommate. Thanks again Kristen for making the effort to connect! Sooo good to see you!)

Refuse to turn on TV. The girls had a lot of that with a the sick days this summer.

Send off edited versions of pictures to Wal-mart one-hour photo in town. It will be tight, but I should have time to still get the photos, mount board and contest labels, and enter the photos before 11:30.

Work on exporting original versions of the photos and uploading them to Walmart's site to print 4x6's as per requirement for contest entries. Finally get those out for printing too.

Call about where to get the entry labels and boards.

Mike comes home for an early lunch to make my life easier. Bless him.

Throw envelopes and spray mount in my purse and jump in the car.

Sprint into Wal-mart at 11:07 to pick up photos.  The lady there has no idea what I am talking about. My order never was received, despite my confirmation e-mail. Suggests it was a glitch. Apparently this happens fairly regularly. Oh. Feel like crying.

Have a nice lunch as a family.

Enjoy a quiet, peaceful moment after lunch. Emily's napping. The girls are drawing a picture together. When queried, Maggie explains she drew a raccoon who was asking a flower "Are you my mother?" and the flower was replying, "No, silly, I'm a flower." Sounds suspiciously like P. D. Eastman to me. Kate tells me she's drawing, "A bench."

I am still feeling fairly annoyed about my wasted morning. I turn around to write something about it quick.

A few sentences in, I am interrupted by a crash. Kate managed to get herself pinned under the bar stool. I quickly pick her up to soothe her and see a big bruise developing on her cheek. She is crying a lot. I am getting a headache. Emily has woken up. She is crying a lot. I am holding both of them. Maggie runs for a band-aid for Kate. Kate doesn't really need one and refuses it. Now, Maggie is crying a lot.

Twenty minutes and a couple books later everyone is soothed and two are asleep. It's only 1:10.

I read my scriptures and waste some time piddling around the house and on the computer.

Maggie and I make treats for visiting teachee and start to fold some laundry.

Kate wakes up. Feeling a little needy and whiny, poor girl. I would too after being ignored by my mother and shook up by injury all before naps.

Call Nadine (sis-in-law) to whine about morning. Brother-in-law Shawn is home and lets me babble on about it to him. We discuss photography for a minute as he's going to shoot pictures of his sister-in-law's wedding. Pretty sure he must think I am incompetent.

Dinner's not happening. I decide on leftovers and scrambled eggs. Mike's home early because he has class. I feel a little embarrassed of me in yoga pants, laundry folding all over living room, dishes all over kitchen, and random little messes in most rooms.

Mike leaves for class. I help kids finish up dinner. Maggie declares dinner delicious, Kate agrees. Go fig. Maybe I should do microwaved scrambled eggs and toast more often.

I start to car to drop off treats and pick up visiting teaching companion and son who don't have car. I usually shuttle them over one at a time since I only have one spare seat. Unfortunately, I realize just now I watched Mike drive off in my car with car seats. Of course I did.

So, cancel on companion. Make visiting teachee pick up treats as she wanted them for that night. See other visiting teachee who lives down the block with the girls on foot.

Come home. Give girls bath. Emily is so cute trying to grab the water as it flows. Spend some time reading and snuggling girls. Leave Mag in her bed to fall asleep and give Kate a backrub on my bed while nursing Em. Feel a little bad for being a distracted, exhausted mom today.

Happy the girls are all asleep before 8:30.

Keep thinking about my friend Becca's recent post "Frustration." Yep, I have those weeks Becca. But hopefully this is just one of those days.

Decide to tackle dishes. Mike gets home. We talk some. Think my friend Jenny's description in a recent text of feeling like a robot-zombie is apt.

Test a cookie bar. Conclude they are not as good as expected. At least I won't feel the need to eat ten.

I get dishwasher started and get a load of laundry folded and another begun. Take a nice shower.

Hang out with Mike, watching some youtube music videos. Enjoy feeling clean. Start this blog post.

Emily has already woken up a couple times. It may be a long night.

Get in bed. Glad I decided to buck up and get the dishes done and a load of laundry folded, even though there are still some other minor messes to deal with another day. Also glad I don't have a dog. Em wakes up. It's after 1:30.

Did you get through that?

Today is already going better. Lower expectations, more relaxing, bed's made. I really do feel so lucky to have three darling princesses.

A few pics from earlier this week:

Maggie painting with a tube of sunscreen on a mirror in my bathroom. I obviously haven't been doing a good enough job of keeping the girls occupied this week and they have been a little stir crazy with all the sick days and the crazy heat this summer keeping us in more than usual. We can only go out first thing in the morning or if water play is related.

Tuesday, the girls all ready to take scones to Dad at work. Yes, they are wearing whiskers. Maggie was so excited when I said yes and helped her draw them on: "So everyone will know I'm a mouse." I was so excited she remembered to ask. The day before I had noticed she drew some whiskers on herself.

The other pic is the girls playing Blink. Both Maggie and Kate are getting very good at that card game of color, number and shapes. Emily really likes trying to get at the cards.

I did mention I love my life, right?

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Friday, we celebrated everyone being well for over 48+ hours with our annual trip to a Royals game. (Well, almost annual. We may have missed one year.)

Thankfully, Kate had taken a good nap. Maggie was so excited about it, she couldn't fall asleep for her mandatory nap before the night game. I was disappointed, to put it mildly, as I was super tired and was hoping to take a nap myself since Miss E was up for two-and-a-half HOURS in the night. She seemed to want to play and talk and coo loudly. And occasionally fuss. But I digress. I let Maggie go anyway and, to her credit, she napped in the car on the way there.

Luckily, the game lived up to the hype. If only the Royals had won, it would have been perfect. As it was, it was near. As you can see, the popcorn was a big hit. All credit goes to Mike for snacks: he checked ahead on snack regulations, popped corn, bought and brought bubble gum and starbursts (formerly known around here as "snarburrs"), and packed everything up. All I did was chill water bottles. And although the girls consumed more sugar at one time than they may ever have before, they were very well-behaved, focused spectators. (Observe Maggie's and Emily's focus on the game and Kate's focus on the popcorn.) Until the last half-hour when they started to get antsy and Mike pulled out a show on his i-phone.

Mike enjoyed taking the girls to the kid zone area, Emily received her official first game certificate (as have her sisters before her), and I eventually found the nursing room (using information provided by Mike's research and the stadium website via his i-phone as none of the very nice employees working at the stadium seemed to know such a room existed and looked at me in confusion when I asked about it, though one suggested I could just lock a bathroom stall and nurse in there...thanks, I've been there before and prefer it not).

Maggie's comments upon leaving:  "I loved watching that ball game" (something along those lines...I just liked her use of "ball game") and before we were out of the parking lot or even in the car, "I miss those Royals." I wasn't sitting by Kate, but I think she was probably saying "yum" and "I'm rather warm."

The main downside of the night was realizing we celebrated too early. Emily woke with a fever in the night.

So, a recap: Mike's a good events planner. Girls love ball games, popcorn and candy. I-phones are useful. Oh, and there were fireworks. Which were enjoyed by all once ears were covered.

Other weekend highlights: Emily getting better (it really stresses me out when one of the kids are sick, especially the baby), the library's reading celebration pool party, and the MoTab's Pioneer Day concert. (Since we finally got a big screen last month to replace our 1990's TV, Mike has enjoyed hooking up the laptop for some BYU TV or Music and the Spoken Word on Sundays.)

And for your enjoyment, last year's game:

 
We went to that one with Mike's brothers and a couple cousins. As you can see, popcorn was a big hit then too. :) Also, I remember it was really, really hot and Kate was really, really wiggly.

Sick Day

We got home from the Gotfredson reunion on Friday and finished up some visiting with Mike's family on Saturday. Then Kate and Maggie promptly fell ill, again. We are on day three of the stomach flu. We just cannot stay well.

Luckily, I came across this via facebook:

Which reminded me of another funny youtube Mike and I liked a while back:

So, what must have been our seventeenth sick day this summer wasn't so bad after all.

"Call Me Maybe" is Maggie's current favorite song. She thinks making a phone with her hand is the coolest thing ever. As do I.

Life Lately

Summer is never good for my blogging consistency. It is yet to be determined what is good for my blogging consistency. I have at least twenty unpublished posts. And scores more I woulda, coulda, shoulda written. Then maybe I wouldn't end up doing these mammoth catch-up posts. I think adding pictures really holds me up. Finishing the text does too. Oh, and all the interruptions from my real life. Life is always getting in the way of trying to record life.

When I started this post it was called "In the Past Month." Unfortunately, that title is no longer accurate. That said...

In May: 

Our beautiful Kansas City temple was dedicated.

Me and a vacuum battled a minor infestation of these tiny black beetles in our car--my research tells me carpet beetles. (I know...gross! We rarely even eat in the car, but someone had dropped a mini Nutter Butter between the car seats...I could make this story longer, but I won't and I doubt you'll beg me.)

I had a smoothie party.

Mike's job provided some employees, including him, an i-phone and data plan. (I guess they are trying to reduce productivity.)

We had stake conference and Mike willingly offered to watch five kids eight and under so Lisa and I could attend the adult session.

I found post-bedtime running buddy. (Thanks, Sam!)

Somebody had a birthday un-party. And experienced her first trip to the ER. But you know this.

I ran a race and got third place. (Mind you, just for my age and gender group and it was a fairly small race. But, it did happen. It was actually the second annual temple 5K and Mike and the girls came and watched. It was fun to have them there.)

Cousins came to stay (twice!) and I got to try my hand with six girls, eight and under.

We donned red, white and blue for Memorial Day and signed up for our library's summer reading program.

Mike went off chaperoning a scout high adventure trip. I kept myself busy staying up way too late, cooking less, letting our schedule get lax, and wearing his shirts to sleep in. Dreaming big and making plans, but not getting much done, while the girls got a fever, got better, and dumped glitter glue all over the guest bedroom, then tried to clean it up using cups of water and a guest towel. I also let them camp out in their princess tent one night which they LOVED.

 In June:

Mike and I went to our annual Chamber of Commerce dinner. We also went out to Applebee's. The first date went better than the second as far as Emily was concerned.

We had doctor and dentist appointments. Maggie is a pro at going to the dentist now. You wouldn't know she cried herself to sleep in Mike's arms in the dentist chair the first time.

Mike chaperoned some Youth Conference.

The girls and I met up with friends at our favorite free petting zoo.

Maggie took swim lessons and Kate was jealous.

Someone had a fever every week. Even I got up to 102 and that hasn't happened since I was 12. Exhausting.

Mike was released from Young Men's duties and will be teaching seminary this fall.

The girls and I attended multiple library events and Mike joined us for an evening one.

There were more visits with cousins. Making a valance with Aunt Lisa, swimming with Aunt Nadine, and playing with Aunt Jenn's kids.

There were park, pool, and playdates. There was some Cinderella and Winnie the Pooh kite-flying. And there was plenty of flower-picking. (I got these little bud vases for less than a dollar that have been a big hit.)

There was cleaning. Lots of cleaning, even though somehow everyone that saw my house this month would probably wonder at that statement. Some nursing cover making and a couple dinners made for friends with new babes.

And there was also plenty of sitting around tired and lazy, after everyone being sick and it being so crazy hot.

And it's already July:

We've made granola, enjoyed a holiday, visited with cousins, and battled a non-allergic Amoxicillin rash, which, of course, peaked on the holiday. And that was after she had suffered a three-day 103 temp the week before and been diagnosed with strep throat. (Poor Emily and poor me...it was freaking me out. Led to much google-searching and several phone interactions with doctor and nurse friends.)

And now that I read this I see why I've been so tired.

I have lots of pics I should post, but I have a love-hate relationship with pictures and my camera and myself and my perfectionistic tendancies. The good news is Mike has been Superman this weekend and been taking on much of the cooking, cleaning, and childcare duties, while I've been trying to learn to navigate Lightroom more efficiently, as well as organize and store our pictures more effectively. The other good news is my spring cleaning is just about done. Too bad we are well into summer.

How was your fourth?