Friday, February 22, 2013

An Obligatory Post

I feel obligated to post on the blog, it is like a curse. 

I really do love my children, I just haven't been a pro at getting pics and videos, and even when I do get pics and videos, then I have that whole hurdle of taking them off the camera and transferring them to the computer.  I really have epic struggles around here, and all of you who want to see cute pictures and videos are the ones who pay the price.

Updates:

1) For my birthday I got an enormous kitchen aid mixer.  It is the biggest one you can get, and it's green (duh!).  I broke it in by making a coffee cake that didn't turn out right.  Everyone else in the family ate some but I couldn't bring myself to eat the ruined cake.

2)  I took on another piano student and through the grapevine I heard another lady in the ward wants me to teach her daughter.  I don't love teaching, but unfortunately I love the kids, so how do I say no?  I mean who needs extra time in the afternoons anyway, right?

3)  Luke is getting much bigger.  And he is sleeping about eleven hours at night.  Hooray!  He is cute, and I did take a couple pictures but of course they are still on the camera.  You can just imagine them in your brain.  My goal is to get some video of him smiling tonight.  It is pretty funny.

4)  Gem is turning into a good girl.  I didn't think this day would ever come.  She is mostly obedient, and she mostly thinks things through and makes decisions that help her and others.  Last night we told her we were having coffee cake for dinner.  She was so happy, she loves that so much.  Then at the last minute when it didn't turn out right, we decided we were having leftover tacos.  Then her daddy made her a quesadilla with beans in it.  She had never had one before and she didn't cry about it at all.  She even persevered through half of the quesadilla and then decided that she didn't want the rest of it.  So we told her that if she didn't finish it, she wouldn't get any messed up coffee cake for dessert.  She thought about it and decided she could go without the coffee cake, and she did, while daddy, Levi, and June ate some.  She didn't cry about that either, though you could tell she was upset.  The point is she is a good girl.  Luckily she got some cake for breakfast (because I felt pretty bad about telling her she was having her favorite dinner, and then changing our minds and telling her she had to eat a bean quesadilla.)

5)  Yesterday Levi made it half a day peeing in the potty.   Then of course today he is back in the diaper.  It is really hard for me to be consistent around here.  He could be potty trained if I could spend all day with him for a week.  Not sure when that is going to happen.  If anyone wants to donate a week of their life to Levi, it would be much appreciated. 

And that is enough for today, I suppose.


Friday, February 8, 2013

June

What, two posts in two days?  This is crazy talk.

I call this video "An Interview with a Junie".

She is pretty funny, because she loves to copy us, especially with the baby.  If I am feeding the baby then she is feeding her baby, and burping the baby, and wrapping up the baby.  She also loves when we tell her that she is doing a good job.  Which is the exact opposite of her sister, who would stop doing whatever she was doing (she still does) if I praised her at all.

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Seriously, It has been a Long Time

Alright, I apologize that I haven't blogged very much lately, I have this weird notion that I should get all my work done before I play.  Which leaves little to no time for playing, and when I do get time to play my brain doesn't think "hmm, I should totally blog right now!"  

I have tons of fun projects  that haven't progressed since November.  For example I was basically two hours from finishing June's quilt and boom. . . it has sat there since the fall.    I started a hat, that was going to be done before Winter was over, and guess what it's not.  Those are just two examples, I have others but I don't need to bore you more than I already am.

 I am not trying to complain, I am very happy with my life.  I just have a lot of work to do.  Having Luke around takes up a lot of time, but I am working on that.  The new year means I have all my new year chores, which might or might not be done by the summer.  Also Gem has homework which I have to be personally involved in everyday for about 40 minutes.   I have also decided that I am going to play a violin solo in church in April, so that means I have to be very diligent in my practicing.  Plus I am trying to exercise once in a while.

I realize that all of this work that I have has been basically imagined up by me, but still it is better than sitting around doing nothing all day right?   I just need to not ignore my children too much, and I will try to still blog at least occasionally.

So let me update you on each of the kids.

Gem is becoming more of an actual person.  She wants to know everything.  We got her a map that goes with her leapfrog pen, and now she thinks we should go to Canada and Mexico because they are so close.  Also she asked me the other day when we will be visiting the Taj Mahal.  Plus she tells me all the things she knows about Russia "the biggest country in the world".   She also wants to know about every animal that has ever lived on the earth.  When she goes to the library at school instead of bringing home fun stories, she brings home science books.  I have had to read to her about rats, clams, Mother Teresa, and many many hard to pronounce dinosaurs.  She is learning to read lots and lots of words, and she is basically a normal kindergartener.

Levi still drives me bananas.  Whenever we are at home he only wants to be at "papa's house" and he cries whenever it is June's turn to pick a show to watch.  He doesn't sleep at all at night, and I blame him for the fact that everyone in this house is exhausted today.  He loves to play with my kindle even though he still only throws the angry birds in the opposite direction, I think he likes watching them hit the ground, it is actually a little disturbing.

June is finally in nursery, but it doesn't really matter because the babies have only been to church one time this winter (it seems like) because someone is always sick.  And if one of them is sick, all of them are sick, that is an unbreakable rule.   June really really likes to accessorize.   She always has at least one necklace on, plus fancy shoes, or a hat.  Her favorite hat these days is Gem's underwear. But she has to pull all of them out of the drawer to find the one or two that go best with her outfit.  If anyone in the house has a hat on there will be no peace until June is also wearing a hat.

Luke is slowly learning to conform to the household.  Some days are better than others. If it was just me and him, he would be a perfect baby, but alas he is number four, so I am not able to shower my undivided attention on him.  He is two months old, and every so often he will flash a quick smile, but you have to watch carefully because it is gone in an instant.  I can't wait until he is big enough to fend for himself, because it is a jungle around here.