thoughts on a sunday. . .with pictures

Special Edition today...

• On April Fools Day McKay had a field trip to the fire station that we all got to go to in the morning, and so after we got home I made them a sneaky little lunch.  We hadn't discussed anything about April Fool's, so they didn't suspect at all.  I made them "grilled cheese sandwiches" which were actually toasted pound cake with orange frosting and "fruit punch" which was Jello with straws in it.  McKay didn't notice until he took a bit and tried to drink, but Ellery didn't notice at all.  She picked up her sandwich and started eating without a word. She nearly ate the whole thing before I told her what it was.  I love how she just didn't question why her sandwich was sweet and just ate up.  McKay especially loved this, and ever since then they both keep saying things and then yelling, "April Fools!"

• About the fire station.  Let it be known that if I were a man I would be a fireman.
  
  
• The weather here has been better lately.  Still a bit cool, but got a great day where we spent hours outside.  I actually got a sunburn!  It was wonderful.  I can't wait to spend more days outside.  Spring is here. . .I hope!

• The kids are way into doing this on the swings.  We call it a tornado.
  

• This little lady now has her very own sippy cup.  I feel like a first time mom with this girl.  Mostly because I've slowly been introducing solids and who ever knows what they're doing when they're introducing solids?  Not me.  Right now she's eating dinner- two jars!- and this week I just started breakfast.  I think I finally have a schedule that we're going to try to follow, but really I'll probably just feed her every two hours until she's morbidly obese and Brian puts and end to it.
  

• Actually, because of my lumbar puncture, I couldn't lift her or get up with her for a night and daddy was on duty.  The next morning he woke up, looked at me and said, "This has to stop.  We're letting her cry tonight."  At that point he didn't even know that I had secretly gotten up with her once during the night.  I was happy that he realized what I've been doing for the last seven months, and I just needed him on board because part of me feeding her so often was to let him sleep at night and I just needed someone to help us.
  
  
• So last night was the night!  She was still up every two hours, but the longest she cried was 30 minutes.  And she didn't cry so much as she just kind of yelled.  I felt bad, but it wasn't as hard as I thought it
  would be.  Life is changing for this baby.  We'll see how she does tonight.
  
  
• Also, it should be noted that Brian wanted to give up when he thought of her doing it again tonight.  We most definitely won't be giving up.  We're in it 'til the end!
  
  
• We enjoyed General Conference last weekend, although by the end of Sunday McKay was openly declaring that he hated it.  So I guess Brian and I enjoyed it.  Conference is good.  Really, really good.  It evokes in us a desire and hope to change.  And brings words of comfort and fortifying peace.  I can't wait to read them all again.  

• I tried a few little things to get the kids through it.  One was having snacks for certain words that were said.  If we heard the word, then we could take a snack from that bowl.  I love this idea, and the kids were really into it for about twenty minutes, but I think next time I would just do one word with one bowl.  It was a little too much for them.  Also they can't read, so there's that.
  
  
• If you were wondering, faith was said the very most.  Those were the raisins, good thing.  I wish they would have said service more. . .those were the candy bars.

• This little man had his first tee ball game.  It didn't rain, well, not really anyway, but it was FREEZING. Ellery made a little cave under a blanket and didn't really even pop her head out once.  McKay did great and tee ball is funny.  The kids are just all over the place.  He was way into it though, and even got to play catcher.  We were proud parents as the ball was thrown home several times and he just watched it roll on by as he was squatting there with all his gear on.  So cute!  I'm still not totally comfortable with tee ball being part of my life, but I'm getting there.  

• After his game, Brian went to priesthood session and I had a few friends over to play and eat pizza and ice cream.  This was kind of good for me because I hate hosting things.  But this was just kind of thrown together last minute, and it was actually really fun.  It made me think that maybe I might not hate hosting things all the time.  Maybe.  Also, it made me think that there are some really neat ladies in my life here and I'm grateful for them.
  
  
• This little miss had her very first ballet class on Monday.  It was kind of horrible.  I loaded all the kids in the car with just enough time to get there.  Turned the key. . .dead battery.  I was so bugged.  I would normally not have cared too much about missing one class- but- she was dressed, so excited, and she had already missed the very first class the week before.  So I was determined to get her there no matter what.  I called a bunch of friends until one picked up, and asked her if she could help me right that second.  She hopped in her car and came right over and stayed at my house while I took her car to the class.  She was a lifesaver, and Ellery was able to make it to over half of the class.  Parents wait outside the door and so I just sent her in and off she went.  She learned to point her toes.  It is precious to see her do it.
  
  
• I'm trying not to be bugged that her teacher said that her ballet slippers are "too hard".  She told me where I could buy real, softer ones.  Um, did you know that my child is three and I already bought her these hard shoes?  And also, did you know that buying new shoes would be like paying for half of the class again?  Yeah, she'll be doing ballet in her bare tights.  So serious.
  

• This picture was taken after class was over.  I couldn't even get one of her inside because I was banished to the hallway.  Awhile ago I tried to implement Monday Bun-day in our house.  I like to put Elle's hair in a messy bun because it's easy and cute.  She prefers her hair long and wild, but will tolerate pony tails pretty well.  Not buns.  So I tried to talk all about Monday Bun-day  and it didn't fly with this girl.  Until ballet that is.  Now I can frequently hear her telling her girls, "I like buns now." and Monday Bun-day is a real thing!
  
  
• This is what happens when I'm on the phone:
  

• I was talking to the doctor's office and McKay could not stop bugging me about tricking Elle (see April Fool's) that he had blood coming out of his mouth.  He was jabbing a marker at me and would not leave me alone no matter what I tried to silently mouth to him.  I finally just grabbed the marker and drew a little line of blood by his mouth.  After I finished on the phone he came over to me and was as proud as ever of his art work.  I was not happy and he was shocked when he saw my reaction because he was under the impression that I wanted him to draw all over his face with a red marker.  Don't know how we got so off there.  But I snapped this picture right after I told him that the red would never come off.
  
  
• Today my little girls were twinners.  Ellery was very happy about this.  Layla wore a headband all day today- which is a first.  Also, several people at church said she looks just like me.   I love my cute girls.
  

• This little babe is kind of sort of interested in crawling.  I thought she might be happy just sitting on her little bum forever, but the last couple weeks she's started moving and wiggling and getting kind of getting into the crawling position.  She goes forward onto her hands all the time now and sometimes when I get her after a nap she's wiggled all the way out of her swaddle and is sideways in her crib- and she couldn't be prouder about it too.
  

• I guess some of you might want to know how my lumbar puncture was.  Ah, I'm just glad it's over.  I had to be admitted temporarily, like a same-day surgery, and so for the first couple hours we just hung out in a little hospital room and waited.  I was wearing a paper gown.  It was not my favorite.  Right before they came to take me to the procedure room I began sweating- really, really, really sweating and my arms went all tingly.  I had been fasting since dinner the night before and so I had a teensy blood sugar thing going on, but the PA gave me some juice (oh sweet juice!) and graham crackers and after a few minutes I was feeling better.  So then she did it and I hated it, but also it didn't hurt as much as I thought it would.  It was really uncomfortable, and hurt a bit, but was mostly just a really disturbing, unnatural feeling with lots of pressure- for twenty minutes.  Yuck, sorry, you probably don't even want to think about it too much.
  
  

• Bad pic from Brian's phone.  I know I can't be picky, but I would have liked to have cuter hair for my lumbar puncture.  After laying down on it all day, it was especially frizzy.  See the paper gown that I hate?  It was plastic inside, so when I got hot, it was just a mess.  Also, you could stick a vacuum thing into it and it would blow warm or cool air inside.  That was the only cool part about the gown.
  
  
• A word about Brian.  It's kind of handy to have a medical professional as a husband in situations like this.  I was glad he was there.  He was able to stay with me the whole time and knew exactly what everything meant and what they were doing- he could have even done it for me!  He was sweet.  Also, he's really smart.  Just in case you didn't know that already.
  
  
• After the procedure I had to lay down on my back for the rest of the day.  I thought I would love this but when you have to lay on your back only for a day it's not as fun as you might think.  I wanted to roll onto my side so, so, so bad.  Also, laying around sounds fun, but actually isn't.  Anyway, my back was really, really sore and achy the first day and night.  I had to sleep on the hump (middle of our bed- does yours have a hump too?) because it was more firm for my back, and so Brian and I actually slept next to each other that night.  It was kind of exciting.  The next morning I was worried that my back might never be the same, but by the middle of the day I could tell it was loosening up the more I walked around and moved.  Today it feels completely normal.
  
  
• So now we just wait.  My annoying doctor is on annoying vacation so it could be up to two weeks before we hear the results.  Or it could be later this week.  That's all just very annoying to me.  I've been feeling a lot of emotions lately, but I can't really say what I'm expecting.  I can see it going either way.  Being prepared, remember?  But I continue to hope and pray for the outcome that I want.  It's kind of funny when the nurses and doctors at the hospital (who are different from my neurologist) asked why I was getting it done, it really does sound positive.  No symptoms at all, except for a few seven months ago that didn't last very long, is very encouraging.
  
  
• Okay, shifting gears a bit.  Today we went on a family drive.  I always want to go on family drives on Sundays, but no one else ever does.  But today we did.  And it was fun!  We drove through all the back country roads behind our house and driving through the country in Oregon is really beautiful.  I said I would give a prize to whoever saw the coolest thing.  Brian saw some really cool hair sheep, which were definitely the coolest, but then McKay saw a teal barn, which happens to be his favorite color, so then, you know, we just couldn't decide.
  
  
• Ellery is obsessed with all the spring flowers that are blooming and wants to pick them constantly.  We are always talking about wild flowers and garden flowers and how you can only pick wild flowers.  Well, it's not the season for wildflowers, except for dandelions- which she picks like they're roses, but daffodils are everywhere around here.  On our drive today we came across numerous wild daffodils and we stopped so that our flower girl could get her fix.
  

• Today McKay was wondering if roosters could fly.  He concluded that they could fly a little, but that jaguars could catch them easily.  He then said, "Yeah, any creditors could catch a chicken."
  
  
• I really don't want to make anyone jealous.  And none of you should be jealous, because you all can probably afford to buy clothes wherever you want.  But I can't.  So when I walked away from Old Navy on Saturday with nine shirts, three cardigans, a pair of jeans, two jammies for Layes, pants for Elle, McKay and Layla, and a pair of leggings for me all for $60 I could have done cartwheels, even with my sore back!  I needed some new clothes desperately because I still can't fit into everything comfortably, and also I was pregnant for like fifty months so after that you just need some new things I think.  Anyway, I love a bargain.  I keep looking at the receipt and telling Brian how much everything was.  It is very exciting around here, I tell ya!
  
  
• Ah, I feel like I just ran a marathon.  Not really, but are you okay?  I feel like I just lost twenty pounds.
  
  
• Oh, and also.  I love this guy.  A lot.  He's quite remarkable if you ask me.  That little baby agrees, especially when he's playing the guitar.
  

Happy Sunday!