Snowy Morning and Upside Down

This morning Ethan headed down to St. George for the All State Jazz Band Rehearsal and Performance. Two afternoons of rehearsal and then the performance on Saturday (I think). Ethan went to a dentist appointment today for his mission papers. He was missing school for All State. He was carpooling down with someone from Alpine, so he had to be down there at 11, so we tried to squeeze it in before. He had a 8:30 appointment. I was going to take him but I was still coming home from taking Hyrum and Wes to school. They were going to take the car, but they got stuck driving out of the neighborhood to school. I figured I'd take them in the van, so I shoveled behind the van, and then right as I finished the snow plow came down the street, so then I thought they'd probably make it okay, so then I shoveled behind their car so they could drive it. They left but got stuck on a turn that left a bit of a pile of snow. The fiesta is pretty pathetic in any amount of snow, so I ran in my boots down the street to help them get un-stuck, and then we brought the Fiesta back home and then I took them to school. They were late, traffic was bad, and when we were finally at the Skyline exit - the offramp was closed! So then we had to drive to Foothill to finally be able to turn around, it was nuts. And they were really late, so even though they did sleep in a little bit, I did excuse it cause it wasn't entirely their fault. So crazy snowy morning. And when I finally made my way home, there was a huge line of cars heading up the canyon. Luckily I knew about Danish road so I took that and bypassed the line, which was a good thing too cause I would have been stuck there for a long time since I found out as I turned away from the canyon, that it as closed for avalanche control. There were a lot of cars thinking they were just waiting for skiiers heading up to the slopes, but no, it was closed. I was glad to get back home and inside and would have been happy to just hunker down for the day, but I had to take E to Alpine. That was a little crazy but not too bad. Ethan shared a fast food life hack while we waited for his ride: Order a root beer drink and mini frosty with your 4 for 4, and presto - you have a rootbeer float.

Also works with orange soda or fanta. My little friends enjoying some fries.

Tonight we were fooling around a little bit with headstands. Here are Daniel and Owen:

They were trying to copycat Wesley and Abi..

The three of us were practicing a tripod headstand. Wes was the best, he held it for over 90 seconds. Peter making a few adjustments to Wesley's technique...

I can get into the headstand pretty quickly and held it for one minute. Today Abi beat her time and held it for 16 seconds. She is the handstand champ though, she's practices handstands a lot and is getting good. She is hoping to learn how to do a walkover. We should get her some professional instruction, but it's kinda fun to just fool around with it. Peter is still my little yoga downward dog baby. He was doing some before bedtime stretches here on Tuesday night. Natalie joined him. Yes, Peter was not paying attention for scripture time again, tsk tsk.

Peter and Ethan playing upside down peek a boo (21 Jan)

Whenever we can tell Peter is about to go downward dog, we like to hurry over and say hi to him upside down. He always seems so pleased/surprised to see us, it's fun. The only time it's not so fun for him to practice his head stands is when he's nursing. He has been doing this more often than I would like. Kinda drives me crazy...

That was a nursing selfie this afternoon. During this nursing session he literally scooted his little feet over and was standing on my stomach as he held onto me with his mouth, which was a first. I'm kinda done nursing... although I've been feeling, thinking, and saying that for a few months now. Here's a few pictures of him on Dec 30th. He looked so sweet, so I also love it...

I've never nursed past a year, except for I think Daniel I might have but it was just at night that I nursed him for a while.

Unlike Daniel, Peter nurses several times a day. So I'm feeling a little trapped by him. Like how my arm is trapped under his sleeping head.

If I move he'll wake up and I won't be able to do anything, so might as well just be resigned to my fate and lay here and listen to General Conference or Teaching with Power, or if I'm feeling like wasting time I'll laugh at Mozart Group or TwoSet Violin videos. If I'm nursing him at the computer the same thing happens - I'm trapped. If I move he'll wake up, so I'm stuck. I have lots to do at the computer though (blog, family budget, write Joseph, etc) so I don't mind so much at the computer, other than it puts my glutes to sleep sometimes depending on how I have him propped. I need a chair cushion. I have a pillow nearby, but that usually goes to Peter. I'll lay the pillow on my lap, lay P on the pillow, then I slouch over the keyboard and let him nurse while I type. Sigh. I am wanting my freedom back though. We'll see how much longer this lasts....

Owen's Owie

This little boy went to the InstaCare tonight for stitches. 

Lucky for him, the scar will hopefully be right in the crack of his nose, which I'm hoping means it will not even be visible. Trusting it doesn't make the skin stretch weird as he grows up. So this is how it happened.... today we got some fun Keva Blocks in the mail. Corey ordered these upon Wesley's recommendation. Wesley usually skips lunch at school so that he can go into the library to play with the Keva Blocks. Wait, he corrected me, he doesn't "play" with them, he "builds intricate architectural designs" with them. The kids started going right to work and were all having fun.

Corey was in his office, I was upstairs, and after a bit we hear a full on "MOOOOM!!!! OWEN'S BLEEDING!!!!" and the thundering of feet as they all came running. Corey intercepted them first and saw the emergency - Owen had a blood soaked shirt and blood in his mouth, we weren't sure where it was coming from... We get them all to calm down, but Owen is still screaming, we were able to wash him off and see that it was coming from his nose. We change his shirt and have him lay down to see how big it is.... The kids said he slipped on something (the floor is a mess downthere....) and fell forward hitting his nose right on the corner of the train table.

He watched some Toy Story on Corey's phone while I checked for how much it was bleeding....

We decide it did look big enough that it would need stitches. So Corey took him in to the Instacare. Owen started to cry again and it opened the wound again "I don't want to go to Doctor!"

Corey took him and Owen did great and was very brave. It was good to see him calm and to see a little grin on his face.

So yeah, there's our first Urgent care visit of the year! These kids are just so fun and busy and active! I had to do some computer work today (Relief Society monthly newsletter) and it was my deadline to get it done, so I gave Peter whatever it took to keep him busy and content and quiet.... so he got to play with a pot of white beans and wheat at my feet.

He thought it was pretty fun!! So many small chokeable pieces!

And it makes a nice big mess, just like laundry detergent or sand! Fun fun.

They are busy fun kids, and quick to destroy. This is a measureing tape that Ethan got out last night to accurately measure his heigth for his mission papers. And he didn't put it back. And Owen and Daniel found it this afternoon and were playing with it, and less than an hour later - broken. It says "Hyper Tough" but apparently not tough enough to survive toddler use!

These kids are super quick at making messes, breaking things, and getting hurt. I guess that's just what comes with life when you're young and the world is so new - they are just so busy learning and exploring the world around them! Which also explains why my life is a continuous flush of stories of cleaning, fixing things, and kissing cuts and bruises. I love it though. I know I'm so lucky to be living this abundant life. An abundances of kids, messes, bumps, bruises, smiles and love.

Rearrange Rooms

Hey, exciting news - it's a snow day! We had a huge storm last night and the streets not plowed. Here's the snow level out our small balcony door

Mucho snow! I have carpool Monday mornings so around 6am, as it continued to come down, I asked if anyone with 4 wheel wanted to trade me. But then we got phone calls that Canyons school district was cancelling school. And all of our carpool families have kids in Canyons, so even though we hadn't gotten word that Granite school district was cancelling school, we all basically decided to cancel it for our families. None of us wanted to go out and drive in that mess. I was glad to have another day to get the work done that we didn't get done on Saturday. I was super productive and it was great to have the kids home to help. We started to rearrange bedrooms last weekend and today we took care of the finishing touches by moving out the train table and switching a dresser for the ikea shelves. And the kids are always excited when the move the mirrored dresser away from the wall, cause they get to make funny faces.

Natalie got stuck behind the dresser in the laundry room while I took pictures of Abi. "Hey! You can't leave me here!"-

We let her out and took her picture - almost a little cyclopse

Pretty fun

Some kind of troll?

or Quasimodo?

We almost made it across the hall when Ethan saw us "Woah, pause. My turn..."

Looking good Eth

Nice.

So, yeah, Abi was happy with the room arrangement. She took up a small desk from the basement to use and a little table and chair for Natalie, so they both have their own little desks in there. Then I asked Abi to be my maid and she worked hard for over 6 hours. I agreed to pay her $10 an hour. I think I probably got a good deal. I have told her I'd hire her, but she's just not consistent. But I was glad to get her help today, hooray for a day off of school!

Mel Home for the Night

Guess what Mel found out about on Friday!?!?! You know the Mozart Group that we just found out about? Well, she saw a billboard down in Provo advertising a show for them - they are coming next Saturday to the Covey Arts Center!!!!

So I got tickets! This was what Mel had to say when I told her I got a ticket for her:

She's very good at finding gifs. So Mel is going to come, and she might bring a date or roommate or maybe I'll let another kid tag along. Exciting though!!! This will be fun! So that was one exciting thing from this past weekend. Abi and her cousin worked on a video for school on Saturday. They got the little kids to help. Here is Daniel - he is Hades.

Pretty good Daniel. He felt very fancy and important.

They made some video about whatever, and as part of their video they pretended they were going somewhere and they got in the Fiesta - and opened the garage, and somehow took it out of gear AND took off the parking brake... and it rolled out into the street. It was exciting and traumatic at the same time. Luckily no one was hurt or killed and no cars got damaged. We're lucky we live on a dead end.

Corey took Wesley down to BYU on Saturday night for a Trumpet Festival, and some of the other kids bummed along too...

They met up with Mel there.

Playing tic-tac-toe in the lobby of Mel's apartment.

Then Corey took them all out to eat at Sonic. He's a nice dad. I'm too cheap to do that, I rarely buy the kids fast food. Maybe just one thing of fries to keep them happy until we arrive at home but yeah,, I don't take the kids out.

Then they all came back home for more quality sibling bonding.

Here's Hyurm home from work, Wes reading, and Daniel watching something funny on Mel's phone and computer. It's always great to have Mel come visit.

Today she joined us at church and we took her back to Provo afterwards. Peter with Mel on the drive home, he looked cute with his hand on his cheek like that.

(No, we usually don't wear seatbelts on the drive to church, sorry....)

It's just up the street and around the corner. We're not trying to be reckless, we're just doing our best to function. Peter showing Mel his yoga moves after church.

Bowling and a Earbookyerb Daerb

Another senior year... another yearbook ad. The website said it was due today, and I did not know that, but phew and yay, I guess I'm glad we finished it! For Joseph's and Melodie's ads, I did not let them know that I was paying attention to the school announcements or that I was even aware of this ad opportunity. I did it on my own with some input from Corey. This one was not done like that. For this one I had Ethan's input. And the title of this post is a hint... letting you know something. If that was not obvious enough, I'll spell it out for ya - Yes, there was some Ferb Latin involved. I was laughing, it turned out pretty funny. I'd say it perfectly sums up Ethan. Corey gave me his input, but I let Ethan have the final word. Corey suggested we say about our Ethan:

"Fearless, funny, and talented at nearly everything you try! Having you in our lives has been one of the greatest blessings we have. As much as we have loved having you home, we are even more excited of the adventure ahead. And we look forward to hearing more hilarious stories. We love you!"

And I liked that well enough. But while we were waiting for Corey's reply, I had jokingly entered this text: "Ewerb reaerbe oserb roudperb foerb ouyerb!" Haha, that is "We are so proud of you" in Ferb Latin. I also added "Love Mom and Dad" and Ethan added his siblings initials. Then when we read Corey's message suggestion. I guess it was too normal and boring for Ethan, so he decided he wanted funny. I jokingly added "We're sorry we were idiots about curfew and our attendance policy..." since those are two things we've had little scuttles with Ethan about this weekend. (He and Hyrum were an hour late last night, aka 12:30) (...and Ethan is bugged that "all his friends' parents" excuse their kids from school when they're late or sleep in or sluff, but we won't excuse his?!?!) Anyway, so I was trying to let him feel like yeah, your parents are lame about that (but we're still not going to excuse you from jazz band or wind ensemble when you blow it off). And Ethan liked feeling justified by my kind-of acknowledgement, and then Ethan added one more line: "You deserve a better CPA than what you got." And with that, we had most of our entry done. Here's the final product.

Ethan also almost put "Congrats on the 243!" (his highest bowling score that he got last month) but then he wondered "But what if I get higher than 243 by the time yearbooks come out!" "Then put 'congrats on the 300' instead!" I suggested. But he didn't know if he could deliver on that number yet, so we deleted that. So the only bowling reference was this pic -

He also took this one, but it wouldn't upload to Jostens cause it was a png file and they couldn't accept that.

Ethan there is showing his form learned after many videos studying proper holds and after following lots of bowlers on Istagram and stuff like that. Ethan says you don't put your fingers in the ball! Who knew? And this last dapper pic that we used is on that Ray took on Thursday. Ethan looking good with the sax and sportin' his nice fresh haircut!

And the 3rd picture we used was my little Ethan who loved cows. Ethan liked this pic cause it has the subtle hint of a Second Coming in the background. Eth is proud to be known as being part of the Lord's Youth Battalion. 

And Ethan has started his own youtube channel. His videos so far are mostly quick and silly. Here his video where he shared his most impressive score from his bowling class:
Check back soon, as I'm sure he'll be adding lots of more great bowling content there soon! ...like his friend Truman's good bowling. (Ethan really likes bowling.) Corey lamented recently "All our hard work and sacrifice and money put toward inspiring them with music, and... he likes bowling...." But it's good to find things you're passionate about. It will be exciting to see what life has in store for Ethan! Maybe he's got a career in bowling in his future, who knows.

A Real Salon Hair Cut

Ethan went and got his haircut tonight. He's only had one done at a salon like once in 2015 when I was away in Brazil and he was here staying with his grandparents in Utah with Joseph. So, at the salon tonight, he didn't know what to do. Like when she went away to go wash his hair, he didn't follow her. Then she turned around and looked at him as he was still sitting there like "Why aren't you coming?" and she motioned for him, and E was like "oh!" And same thing at the shampoo sink, he didn't know what to do so he saw upright on the chair, and she told him to lay back. Funny. "So, where do you usually get your hair cut?" "My mom does it." "Why didn't she do it today?" And Ethan didn't want to explain everything about his thinking... which was: "Well, this was a spur of the moment thing cause I'm getting some senior pictures taken by my sax teacher and so this morning he texted me that I should bring my suit for a few 'mission pictures' too, but last night I was told my hair was a too long for my mission paper submission, so I didn't get want to risk it not looking "missionary" enough but I wasn't able to get it cut before I came down here to Orem, but I decided I should do it now etc etc...." ....So instead his answer was "She picks her nose" and implied I do so while I'm cutting his hair, and that I let boogers get in his hair and the stylist was speechless at how wrong that was of me to do to him. When he told us all of that tonight, I was like "My goodness....YEARS of cutting hair service that I've given to you from the love of my heart (and the frugalness of my wallet).... trimming your hair your whole LIFE, and just like that, for no reason at all other than to save yourself from having to make small talk, you threw me under the bus..." He said he knows it was wrong and apologized to me. Apology accepted. His haircut looks great though! I'm excited to see the pictures he got taken! I wanted a quick pic of his face. I told him to give me a smolder. He was like "OH NO!!! I DIDN'T DO A SMOLDER PHOTO!!!" Such a shame. This one will have to do.

Ok, we got it for posterity. Enjoy that hair while you got it. In a few months... the MTC clippers are coming for it! 

Two other exciting things from today - My blog books arrived! That was super quick! I just ordered those last week on Jan 21st! So I have my anniversary gift to Corey ready, and with that, the 2010's are done. All of my blog books are gray binding so far, but I think I'll change it for the next decade of the 2020s. 

And Daniel is ready for school. He was wearing a backpack around the house today and saying it was time to go to school.

And Owen would hear that and say "Noooo! I can't go to school!" And I am worried if Owen is going to be ready by fall. Part of me wants to let Owen stay home, but these two like to battle and get on my nerves, so it might be better to begin to separate them. Owen will be 5 years old in July, so he'll be a young kindergartener, like Hyrum was.... and he's kinda nervous about new things sometimes, like Hyrum was... and it makes me worried it will be like Hyrum was in elementary school. Maybe Daniel could pretend he is Owen? Or I'll just have to trust and hope that Hyrum was a unique case and things will be fine with Owen. Hyrum's turned out fine, there's nothing to worry about. But Daniel seems super ready, like Abi was. And Daniel is a darn September birthday, like Abi was. (That stupid September cut off) Maybe I'll sign Daniel up for preschool or make sure he has playdates set up? Hopefully Owen will be ready and my current concerns will prove to be all for naught, and Daniel will be content to hang out at home with his homebody mom. We'll play school, I'll do it buddy! I'll get crayons and we'll color and learn ABCs and stuff, it will be good.