Some Recent Stories

I'm BAA-AACK!

Has it really been that long since I wrote? There are a few really good reasons for this:

-I have really given up sitting. Like, I try to only do it when I have to (sans dinner time). I'm kind of undergoing a health revolution, again, and part of that means, for me, computer time = destroying my health. I'll blog about it in more detail later. Hopefully. At any rate, I basically feel like I'm rationing my computer time all the time, which is sad because there is a lot of fun to be had on my ungracefully aging laptop.
-I'm pregnant!! I'd thought to wait to announce this til I had an ultrasound pic to go with, but who knows when that will be. We are due end of August (16+ weeks) and we are all thrilled. Point is, I've been pretty sick for the last three months or so, and it's been much worse then my other two (and I didn't just forget). Started a lot sooner, lasted a lot longer. I shouldn't even be typing this, I should be sleeping...

OK- now on to the stories that compelled me to sit down right at this moment.

I should start out by saying how beautiful today was! We get one really nice out of ten during March in Idaho. The rest of the time it blows constantly. Oh, how I detest the wind! So I threw the windows open nearly first thing this morning and just ate up the sunshine and the only slightly frigid air coming in.

We have been potty training again. And yes, we gave up before because I was too sick to do it right. Emiline has this uncanny ability to keep her night and naptime diapers dry. One day last week, we went through 5 panties and pants but both her diapers that day were dry! Grrr!!! It's a matter of motivating her to announce that she needs to go, which I figured out today. We had some gorgeous weather and so this morning we all went for a walk. I told Emiline that if she had an accident on our walk she'd get really cold and sad and it wouldn't be any fun. On our way home through a field she told me, I whipped off her pants and held her up while she went! Then Grandpa took us all to McDonalds (for the outdoor playground, again, the nice weather) and I told her if she had an accident, she would get in trouble, wouldn't get to play on the toys and would have to sit in the car. She did great. I did not, however, communicate the consequences at the hardware store, but I made her experience the consequences a bit while there. I made her stand in her mess (I cleaned up the puddle, not her) and we kept on shopping and she felt left alone while my dad went for the emergency bag out in the car. The section of the store we were in was all low counters so I could walk where she couldn't see me but I could see her. She cried and kept saying "I don't like to be wet!" It worked well for us, but I'm sure the people in the store were glad when we left ;-)

Back to our morning walk- we tend to do a version of the same basic path a lot these days. We walk through the backyard and explore my dad's junk pile of old wood and things and then back to the two "balance bridges" that cross the two ditches at the back of the property and then we climb out a low spot in the fence and take the ditch road a ways. Jane loves to walk in the ditch, it's such an adventure of shells and random hills of sediment and weeds. Today we made it to a portion of the ditch that is full of snow all winter because it is the drifting spot of the field next to it and it's angle towards the sun. They thought it was so neat to walk on "waves of snow." Then we crossed through a field to circle back home. It was delightful, even though we didn't stop at the church to play Hide and Seek like we often do, much to Jane's disappointment.

Our scrappy cat, Kafi Achilles Bandit always comes with us on our walks. She thinks she's a dog. There is a tomcat that is starting to think he lives here, too and sort of picks on Kafi and today that tom kept showing up on our walk, too. I'd chase it away and tell the girls what a mean cat it was. They would comment on how it should be nice, etc. Anyway, shortly after Emiline pottied, the cat showed up again and then Jane started singing a song, "Lullaby" from our church's children's songbook. I've sung it to them since they were babies but change the words all the time. So she starts singing it and I'm not really listening but I think there were things in there about sharing and kindness and loving. When she finishes, she turns to me and says: "Mom, I sang that song so that cat would fill the spirit and be nice." Sort of blew me away! I have told her often when I feel the spirit during music and she's been learning in church how the spirit helps us choose the right. But she put them together.

We had a great, long, walk. I pushed them on the swings, we jumped on the tramp for a bit, then ran inside for a potty break and a snack. While upstairs, I hear this strange fluttering noise and notice some things from on top of the very tall armoire on the floor. Then I see out of the corner of my eye the fluttering and hear a "Bang, bang, bang" as a starling that got in to the house, I'm assuming from the windows I threw open earlier, tries to get out a shut window. Jane and Emiline think it's the coolest thing ever and Jane wants to keep it and hold. I call my dad up and luckily it flies down from the vaulted ceiling and for another window in the half bathroom. My dad, quite deftly I must add, catches the thing and as I got to open the door to let it out he says, "or we could just feed it to the cat." I tell him no and that the cat should catch it's own food and the pretty bird goes free. Quite an exciting end to our morning. More exciting was finding little "presents" from the bird the rest of the day. We had been identifying cow and horse poop on our walk and we got to identify bird poop afterwards at home!

Later today, we went back outside to ride bikes. I knew how it would go, that I would be pushing them most of the way and probably carrying the bikes, a Radio Flyer tricycle and a simple toddler ride-on push type toy. But we went over to the church anyway. It's sure nice to have such a long bunch of smooth pavement to play on. Emiline couldn't figure out how to make herself go forwards on the ride-on toy. But Jane did much better than I expected on her tricycle, except she kept stopping to ring the bell to "warn" everything, "all the cars," the church, me, Emiline, the cat, the tomcat. It was nice little memory we made. Then, on the way back, Emiline's shoe slipped off while she was running at full speed and she smacked hands then face into the pavement and just howled. So I ended up carrying the bikes and Emiline back home. But it was nothing kisses and a Popsicle couldn't fix.

And, here's the icing on the cake (except I don't like icing, so we'll say fruit topping and cream on the cake): No fights at dinner. Both girls ate what was basically new/not a standard/accepted meal from their repertoire, with grace and timeliness. It helped that there was an unfinished Diego episode waiting for them. And they just had to find out how Diego would save the baby humpback whale.

After they were in bed, I made a circle cowgirl skirt to add to the dress up box. Here's the other way we are upping the potty-training ante. Every time Emiline announces she has to go potty BEFORE she goes, she gets a potty present, something to add to her dress up box. She earned a pirate hat and a cowgirl hat today and hopefully she'll get the skirt tomorrow. I've been finding things here and there for at least a year now that I've been hanging on to til they were really ready to appreciate dress up. Now is the time!

Other fun recent things: On Monday I was feeling GREAT. The first real, totally good day I've had this pregnancy, so I demoed my parent's half bathroom, took down the wallpaper and tile. And, note to self, wear gloves when demoing tile next time...I had a fabulous time actually doing something productive and physical. Can't wait to put up the tile, paint, and put in new floors!

Tuesday was Idaho's republican primary caucus, the first one we've had. We got a babysitter so it was also date night, and we both went. It was exciting at times, really neat to have that many people gathered all together. But also frustrating as there were some technical hiccups. Sorta needed a dress rehearsal, I guess ;-) It always amazes me how much more connected I feel to Eric when we spend a few hours together away from the house and kids. Even if we don't talk much or do anything interesting. It was nice. So for those of you interested, the breakdown of votes in Cassia County of Southern Idaho were 144 Santorum, 143 Ron Paul, 28 Gingrich, and 1200+ for Romney. I didn't catch the rest of the number as the crowd was too loud and the announcer too quiet. But he won by 80% so there was only one round of voting and we went home early. We also sat in front of some high school kids who were voting for the first time and didn't know a thing about the candidates "Gingrich was speaker of the house?!?" or what was going on "Wait, we're voting tonight?" and we heard all kinds of stories about the exploits of teenage hicks for an hour "Yeah, she's mad at me because I showed up for our date drunk..."

Wednesday was also a fun day, more fun in retrospect. It was my turn to teach preschool and one of the topics this month is nutrition. I stressed a bit on how to teach this to 3 and 4 year olds but in the end came up with something fun. We talked about babies and who had babies in their house and who used to be a baby and what babies eat and how they grow up. Then we talked about the different kinds of food and what they do for our bodies and how they help us grow. I called grains "energy food," dairy and protein "strength food" and fruits and veggies "grow food" and I made up a little action for each. We all pretended to be tired and then found some energy food. I had bowls of a bunch of different kinds of grain and pasta and cereal and rice and let them glue them to their first puzzle piece. Then we talked about Strength foods and ran and jumped and hung and swung from the pull up bar. They really liked it. We glued a picture of a muscle on the next puzzle piece. Then I pulled out coloring sheets of fruits and veggies, like 20 different ones on each paper and we identified them and their color and talked about how they help our bodies grow, and colored them and I had this cute rainbow graphic that was made up of fruit and veggies. We glued that to our last puzzle piece and then stapled them to a paper plate and put a magnet on the back so they could stick it on their fridge. It was a hit...OK, it was a hit with 2 of the 5 all the time and a partial hit for 2 more and just a walk for the youngest. But Jane, and even Emiline, really liked it and we've been using it since to help her understand she needs lots of different kinds of foods, and less cheese and more "grow foods."

Now that I've completely sabotaged myself by staying up and hour and a half later, I'm going to go and finish my evening with some HGTV and a bowl of cereal before I hit the hay. That blood sugar is my tyrant!