Object lesson

While teaching a room full of 4 year old boys a lesson on obedience, I dropped and broke the glass on the family picture I brought as a visual.  Of course, all the boys wanted to crowd around and see.  I told them to sit in their chairs while I cleaned it up.  Then I told them that it's like their parents.  Their parents tell them to do things so that they don't get hurt.  When they obey, they are safe.  Whoops.  At least it worked into the lesson.

Cast

Guess who got their cast off today?! Had to celebrate at this little snow shack that I never see anyone at...

Fertility run

There are a couple local runs that support families struggling with fertility. This last Saturday, we took our kids on it hoping to win the raffle for a free IVF treatment. There weren't many people there so we had a pretty good chance... We didn't get it, but it's hard to feel bad because the one that did get it was in shock and so happy once it processed. Ada was not feeling good. She cried the entire time.  After a good long nap, I took her to her friend's bday party and to Allen's baptism. There were some complications so it was two hours long. I played lots of music to fill in the time and Ada really wanted to just see the baptism and be done. I took her out to Jamba Juice after for being a good sport. Then we tried to catch the tail end of the Parkinson Reunion and irrigation at Grandma and Grandpa's.  Fun and busy Saturday.

Pretty lucky

So I think the chicken pox vaccine is great. Evelyn and maybe Ada have it but both are such mild cases that the kids are happy. A baking soda bath each night and they're good to go. This isn't a great picture, but this is the worst spot of it on Evelyn.  I read up on it and those that get it after getting vaccinated have a mild form of it and generally recover faster. And the kids catching it helps Jer and I not catch shingles. Plus all around. The only downer is trying to keep kids away from others so we don't spread it.  Ada has a few spots on her face and one on her arm. Evelyn has them all over her thighs and bum and a few on her tummy.

Ada to Sammy

"No, just toss it up the wok rall!" (Rock wall)

And it starts

Everyone has to experience it sometime right?  Evelyn has the chicken pox.  We thought it might be roseola because her two year old cousin had it last week,  but my trusty "in house nurse" aka: mom who's been a nurse for 35 years or so, said that roseola has a flat rash and that Evelyn's were definitely bumps so maybe now we'll have given all the cousins a new thing right before school starts.  Lucky.  We've seen quite a few cousins in the last week.  Sorry guys.  I don't mind so much (at least they're not throwing up), but I hope that Ada can catch it and be done with it before school starts in three weeks.  Is that a funny wish?  A friend of mine even asked if she could bring her kids over to play so that they'd catch it now and not later. 

Ironically, just thinking about chicken pox is making me itch all over.  I had them when I was 3/4 years old, just the thought of them in the house is making me all itchy.

Funny kids

Sunday was adventurous today. 

Evelyn wanted more than anything for me to, "Go Mommy, go!  Nursery!" She was determined that Nursery would start as soon as she got to church, not as soon as Nursery started.

When asked if the kids wanted hotdogs for dinner, Sammy said, "No not tonight. I'd like them Thursday for lunch."

Ada was 'playing' the piano and Sam decided that he'd like to play too.  Ada, "Sam!  No, I'm practicing a song for Grandma and you're ruining it!"  Sam, "Sorry!  How did it start?"

Ada completely spilled milk shake all over her face and down the front of her dress.  She was rather distressed.  She bawled that she had spilled on her new shoes.

Ada sat behind me during Primary and kept tugging on my hair.  I didn't mind, but then she starting patting my behind through the back of the chair and saying how big it was.  Nice.

And Evelyn has declared that she's a shark, just fyi. 

Sammy's Sundays

Sam has this cute bow tie and suspenders set.  In Primary, I'm the only teacher for my class of 7-10 four year olds. Sam had to go to the bathroom in the middle of sharing time and since he's mine I just let him go on his own. While I was wrestling the noisy one, the scared one, and the crying one Sam came in carrying his pants in his hands... Still wearing his shoes and socks and luckily his underwear. What a sight...

Love these guys

I just love these guys.  No it's not easy being a mom but I'd rather have my hands full than my hands empty. With all the challenges that come along with motherhood and childhood, I think we're ready to face a few more of them.  Maybe it's time to tackle Evelyn's binkie addiction.  Maybe it's time to tackle potty training.  Maybe it's time to reteach Ada not to wet the bed at night.  Maybe it's time to teach Sammy not to worry about first world problems.  But these are all small worries.  Ada will be starting school in less than a month.  She will learn to be kind, she will learn to not cry over the drop of a hat, she will learn that other little kids don't want to be mothered. She will learn other things that will be negative as well, which is what Jer and I are for.

With the last two busy months, I decided that I was going to take today as a "me" day.  I was going to update my blog, finish some personal unfinished projects, not clean, not teach reading, not teach piano, etc...  At first it went okay.  The kids went outside and collected roly-polies. They played together nicely.  They made a huge toy mess and in general just had fun.  I let them have as many fruit snacks as they wanted, etc... I didn't want to scold or anything.  I wanted to accomplish my selfish stuff.  But as I continued to leave them to their own devices, they began to get grumpy, started to fight, and eventually started to hurt each other.  They need things to do.  They need things to learn.  A half day of nothing was enough for them... more than that and they were bored.  I could have turned on the tv for them, or the wii, but honestly I wanted them to have a day to just be kids not zombies.  It seems like kids need parents in order to be kids.  I'm honored to be one of those parents.  We may or may not be able to have any more of our own.  Our kids may or may not decide that we are the bad guys.  Other parents may or may not agree with our lifestyle.  But God's work moves on.  Babies continue to be born to families, families continue to learn and grow, and we get to decide what we are going to do with ours daily. 

Playing house with cousins

Yuji's laundry

Doing Yuji's laundry was quite the exciting adventure.  Pretty much all of his clothing was 100% cotton or dry clean only and the trick was that pretty much all of his tags were tricky to read.  Japanese of course.  Some had English translations like the one below, but some of them had translations in Spanish/Portuguese.  Luckily I read Spanish and can make out some Portuguese.  I loved the translation below.  Awesome.

Hanging with the Wilcoxes

We got to hang out with my family this week.  We went to Jump on It with everyone.  That was so fun!  I'd never been before and very much enjoyed it.  I want to go again when I don't have a cold and can't stop coughing.  

My cute nephew

Adventure is out there!

Evelyn knows how to manipulate.  Seth, hold my bubbles!

Love Grandpa!

Treasure hunt by sweet aunties

My forever mommy

Nuts.