Not Yet Ready

For The Christmas Post.  Or for this post either, for that matter.

You see, my littlest man turned  8 months old the day before Christmas Eve.  Christmas Eve Eve, if you will.

It seems that the only way to keep him little is to take photos from farther and farther away.  Or is it further and further?

I love this face!

I love all his faces, really.

Even if he's stuffing more nasty wrapping paper in it.

So, 8-months doesn't require a check up.  And I decided he's just going to be my little guy, so we've stopped doing the weight checks.  This means, that we don't know any of his actual factual stats.

But we do know that he still has just two teeth.  The stuff up top that looks like a whole bunch of teeth, is still just more of the nasty paper.  Those two teeth on the bottom are legit.  If you don't believe me, let him chomp down on your finger.  They are sharp!  I still have a mark on my shoulder from him biting me this morning.  I seem to be his favorite person to bite.  It must be love.

We also know that he still has fabulous hair.  In case I forgot to tell you this before--I LOVE his hair.

We also know that he has a precious smile that he is more than happy to share with anyone and everyone he can make eye contact with.

He has started rolling all over the place to get around.  Time to start baby proofing.  He doesn't seem remotely close to crawling, though.  I think I still hold him too much for him to even think about practicing.

He loves to snuggle and cuddle.

He is still thumb sucker, but seems somewhat less attached.  Maybe that's just wishful thinking...

And mostly, I know that I am still completely in love with this littlest man of mine.  Stop growing so quickly, Littlest Man!

Tradition Gone Amuck

Did someone say "presents"?!

Kayli is always such a sweetheart.  She made ornaments for Blake and me to open on Christmas Eve.

They were Indiana Jones ornaments, of course.  Indiana Jones is still the current obsession.

Since we were on our own for the very first time, we decided to invite some friends over for Christmas Eve dinner.  We had the traditional clam chowder, breadsticks, and yummy fruit drink that Blake grew up having at his grandma's home.  Our friends brought delicious roasted rosemary carrots.  Trey and I couldn't get enough of them.  Seriously, the baby ate about 20 of them.

Then our friends said good night and we moved on to the next tradition:  opening presents on Christmas Eve.  I grew up opening one present each year on Christmas Eve--an ornament from my grandparents.  Blake grew up doing the same, only it was new pajamas, I think.  So, we wanted to carry on tradition, naturally.

Except, I began getting everyone a special ornament each year since my first Christmas with Blake, my parents give everyone an ornament, and Blake's grandma gives everyone an ornament.  And then there are the Christmas p.j.'s.

Needless to say, everyone opened more than one gift that night.

Trey's first gift.

Bryce got a firetruck ornament, since he's still in love with those.

Not sure what to do with this.  When all else fails, try eating it.

I really struggled to find a meaningful ornament to give Kayli this year.  Her interests (Indie and Scooby) are hard to come by.  But when I found this violin ornament the night before, I knew it was meant to be. I could hardly contain myself.  And she was so excited she inhaled her lower lip.  Or something like that.

Still working on it...

Big Brother decided to jump in and help

Or, just take over.

It was sort of a theme throughout the night.

But Little Brother didn't really care.  As long as he had a wad of wrapping paper, he was happy as can be.

See?  Yes, he is eating it.  Once again, I blame my poor mothering on the necessity for picture taking.

Don't you just love Christmas jammies?

And the smiles on my boys' faces?  My sweet little Kayli seems to be going through some sort of issue with her smile.  It is a beautiful one.  I'm sure she'll find it again, someday.

Not yet, though.  That little bag contains oatmeal and glitter.  The oatmeal is food for the reindeer; the glitter is to help Santa see it from the sky.

I let them go spread it all over the yard.  The necessity for picture taking was not stronger than the necessity for staying warm, so we have no photos of this event.

Just so we're all clear on my priorities.

Blake and the kids made shortbread cookies for Santa.  They are his favorite cookie this time of year.  Or so I'm told.

It's funny to me that Santa gets to eat all those cookies when Mrs. Claus is the one who does the majority of gift finding, purchasing, and wrapping.  But I guess Mrs. Claus doesn't need all of those calories anyway.  And this year, Mr. Claus did have to make his own cookies.  So, everything is fair after all.

I guess we can move on to Christmas Day!

Blankets And "The Rich"

So, one of my awesome sisters-in-law inspired me to do a little service this year and make blankets to donate to the Children's hospital.  I wanted to have some service project the kids could help with to help them focus on others to prevent the egocentric-ness that sometimes latches onto small children during the Christmas season.  But then I realized that I wanted to make a bigger impact than we could do on our own.  So, I invited my friends to join in the effort.

And they joined in in a big way.

I love my friends.

Here are the 37 blankets we ended up with.

That's a lotta blankets, people.  And they represent a lot of effort and love.

Thank you, Awesome Friends of Mine!

We took these up to the big city on the 23rd, so the hospital could get them all ready for the Christmas packages being handed out to the children on Christmas Day.

While we were up there, we stopped at a little shop and purchased the Best Christmas Present Ever.  Well, the best materialistic Christmas present ever, at least.  But I haven't photographed it yet, so I'm not going to spoil the surprise just yet.

In other news, for anyone wondering what a "rich" (see The Transformation of Little Man, if you don't know what I'm talking about) looks like:

This is what a rich looks like.  And I'm the lucky mama of a little boy who pretends to be a rich All.  The.  Time.

I love being the lucky mama.

Merry CHRISTmas!

Just thought I'd copy today's Abiding Joy Post:


Today was a nearly perfect Christmas. As far as gift giving and receiving goes, everything felt exactly right. Not too much or too little. Things went smoothly, too. The kids have played happily with their toys--no bratty outbursts or tantrums. HH took a nap while the kids and I put together and played with all their stuff. I was able to do my traditional Christmas Day run, although not in the traditional way. I love to run outside on Christmas day because virtually no one is out and it feels so peaceful, but I got outside today only to discover that the ground was covered in a lovely, smooth sheet of glass. Or ice. And I didn't dare run on it. So, I went back in downtrodden, but HH insisted that I keep my tradition (it's been in place since long before I met him) and helped me get the treadmill "fixed" and running again!

And then we went carolling at an assisted living facility with some friends. It was really fun. And visiting with some darling, sweet ladies after was delightful. I think the kids and I will make some repeat visits.

But the true Joyful Moment today comes from the reason we have today--our Savior, Jesus Christ. Because a tiny baby was born in Bethlehem thousands of years ago my life has meaning. I know who I am and where I came from. I know that I am a child of God. That my children are children of God. I know that after this life, my life will continue. I know that my family can be my family forever. Forever and ever and ever. I never have to be separated from my HH. I know that He is the ultimate source of Joy and that what He wants most for me is eternal Joy.

In that spirit, I wish you all Joyful Moments regardless of whatever else life is offering right now in knowing that Jesus Christ loves you!

If you want to know more about what I believe visit www.mormon.org.

Merry Christmas!

Short Term Pain, Long Term Gain?

I really (really) like my peace and quiet.  Really.

So, you can imagine how delighted I was when I looked out my kitchen window and saw this:

"Hooray" was definitely one of the first words out of my mouth.  Or, maybe not.

But I did quickly alert these two to the fun and excitement going on right next door.  And they promptly ran outside to watch.  And then promptly ran back inside to get some warm outerwear.  And then promptly ran back outside to watch again.

We strive for promptness in this family.

Blake is just glad that it's winter here at the North Pole, so I'm not staring out at these guys shirtless all day.  Not that I would be staring...

Truth be told, I was a little grumpy about this.  It looks like a noisy, dirty project if I've ever seen one.  Not to mention, the floor in my kitchen actually shook a little as a dump truck rolled by.  Sweet.

But then, I realized what this could mean--neighbors!  I mean, it almost certainly means "neighbors", but it could mean neighbors with young children.  To play with my young children.  To carpool with next year when we lose bus privileges.  To eat barbecue and play Bocce ball with all summer.

You know, that kind of "neighbors".  That could make it worth the noise and the mess.  Maybe.  They'd better be fantastic neighbors to make up for destroying the field next door and home of the garden spiders.

I have a feeling, these two will be doing a lot of staring over the next several month.

The Transformation of Little Man

My Brycie Boo had his Christmas program at preschool yesterday.  It was precious.

I love this photo because it so perfectly shows what kids this age are like.  The randomness in which they express the energy overflowing their tiny bodies.  The little boy casually doing the sit-and-reach, a couple absently staring out the window, the little girl sucking on her fingers, one clasping her hands in eager anticipation, and my own little man apparently taking his sweater off.

But then he did something shocking:  He addressed all of the many grown ups sitting in the room to explain the bag of glitter and oatmeal they were each bringing home in their backpacks.  He told them that it was to feed the reindeer and that the glitter would help Santa be able to see it from the sky.  And I just stood there stunned.  And kicking myself that I wasn't video taping this momentous moment.  This is my shy shy shy Little Man.  He NEVER talks to grown ups.  Never ever.  Let alone, a whole room of them.  Amazing.

It took me a few songs to realize that this face meant, "Why aren't you looking at me?!"  Because I was looking at the Bryce I saw in my video camera and digital camera lenses--not the sweet one desperately seeking eye contact.  Sorry, Buddy!  But I did eventually catch on and set one camera down, so I could smile at my real cutie--not the one on screen.

And here he is being himself.  I'm pretty sure that he is pretending to be a "rich".  A rich is some form of freaky animal he imagined up.  It's too bad you can't see the lovely face that goes with the freaky fingers.  But if you know Bryce, you can probably imagine something up.  Just remember--riches are pretty scary.

See the nose of the poor little girl to his left?  Don't worry, his sweet friend on the right got bopped in the face a few times, too before the performance was over.

I told him to wear his sweater, so he'd look nice for the program.  It wasn't until I got there that I noticed he'd chosen his boots to accompany said sweater.  At least I tried...

Be still, my heart.  Look at these sweet faces!

And then it was snack/craft time.  We decorated an ice cream cone like a Christmas tree.  Fantastically messy!

I asked him if he wanted to eat it, or take it home to show Daddy and Kayli.  He, of course, chose to eat it.  I wondered how he would do it because he is quite averse to getting messy.  This technique took him almost no time to think up.  And it worked like a charm.  He had very little frosting on him by the time all was said and done.

Is it wrong that I love this about him so so so much?

I loooooove that face!  Ignore the identity crisis my bangs are experiencing and just focus on that cutest of smiles.

There's Hot Lava In The Sky

First--I forgot to explain my last post to those of you who are relatively new to our blog.  That is the sweet sweet love story belonging to Blake and Yours Truly.  If you aren't caught up, or need a refresher, or just love reading about our love, check the side bar links under "The Most Romantic Story You Never Read".  That's my clever title for our love story.

Back to the hot lava in the sky.  Two things you should know--

1.  I have a great passion for beautiful skies.  I have a multitude of photos from back in the day.  Then we moved to New England and I could never see the sunrise or sunset thanks to the over abundance of trees.

Then we moved here.  There are too many trees to see the sunsets, but we have a clear view of the sunrises.  That just means I have to be awake in time to see them.

2.  There aren't any school-aged children on our street, so we've been traveling about a 1/4 mile to Kayli's bus stop every morning and afternoon.  It's okay, because obviously, it's still closer than the school.  But it became a bit of a pain once it became bitterly cold.  And it's a bit of a problem in the afternoon because the boys are usually still napping.  Meaning, I leave them behind.  Alone at the house.  I can still see the house from the stop, but if someone broke in to steal my precious babies, I'd never get there in time to stop them.

And it was a problem whenever Kayli got of the bus in desperate need of a bathroom.  But that story is classified.

Anyway, you might be wondering what this has to do with a beautiful sunrise, or you might know me well enough to know that I have a tendency to ramble.

But I do have a point.  When we came back from the Super Long Thanksgiving Trip, I just couldn't get coordinated and we kept almost missing the bus.  And then there was the afternoon that I forgot that Kayli had early dismissal that day and I just never showed up at the bus stop to pick her up.  Instead I got a phone call from Blake who had received a phone call from the school informing us that Kayli had been returned to the school and I could pick her up there.

Wow.  I felt like a great mother.

And then the next morning the bus driver told me that she could set up a different stop for us.  It's right on the corner of our street.  Which is only one house away.  So, we get to hang out in the slightly less freezing garage until we see the bus coming up the street ad Kayli makes a run for it.

Which means that we get to just hang out and watch beautiful sunrises.  And freeze.  But still, it's so much better than the previous situation.  I love our bus driver.

"There's hot lava in the sky!"

I wanted to show off the super cute hat my friend made.  But this was the pose she gave as she yelled the above statement.  I love my princess.

"Mom, can I shove?"

That's what he asks me every morning while we wait.  Because I guess that's what you do with a shovel--you shove.

I love my little man.

You can see what a tough job it is too, with all the snow we have.

A Wednesday On A Saturday?

The Dilemmas

"The Tuesday after that (Valentine's Day) I got a big package from Nathan for Valentine's Day And I flipped out again.  I thought maybe all this stuff that I was getting from him suddenly was a sign that I was making a mistake.  It was a terrible day.  Blake could tell something was wrong but I knew it wouldn't do any good to talk to him about it until I'd sorted out my thoughts a little better.  And for the first time, he didn't push it with me to tell him.  I called Mom the next day because I needed someone who'd be totally unbiased.  That was the best thing.  She said she'd felt prompted to call me but thought it was too early.  Talking to her helped me to realize that I really did know that Blake is the right one because everything pointed me to him.  I just wanted a reason why Nathan wasn't the right one.  But I don't know if I'll ever get that.  As time wears on though, I'm more and more okay.  And every time I doubt things, I'm more sure when it's all over that Blake is the right one."

Translation of my youthful dramatic writings:  I received a big package from Nathan.  It had a puzzle with a sweet message written on the back of it.  And these two cute little ducks that were attached by a string.  You pulled them away from each other and they would wriggle back together in a kiss.  You know how young couples in love are kind of silly about all sorts of different things?  Ducks were one of those things for us.  It had to do with all the baby ducklings being born around campus the spring that we fell in love and then just kind of continued from there, complete with a little duck I sent to be his little mission buddy when he first left.  So, these two ducks really got to me.  Nathan had apparently not received my "Dear John" letter, since being deported from Russia to Estonia.  This was a dilemma.

But then, when I got confused about how I felt about Blake, I would resort through my feelings, and then I would realize (again) that Blake was the right one.  The one I should choose.

In other news, Blake had his first contact with my parents around this time.  And my oldest brother and his family came down for a visit.  We even got to watch their youngest child at the time.  He was a toddler and was beyond entranced by Blake's amazing farm animal imitations.  And I fell in love with him even more.

And I was invited to dinner at Blake's grandma's house.  It was wonderful and we played some fun games after, but I left feeling uncertain of how she felt about me.  Until she called Blake the next day to give her approval.  Whew!

There are ducks here, look in the back

My Version.

It’s been nearly 9 months since our last “How We Met” installment.  Unfortunately, as things really started to heat up with Cheryl, I stopped writing in my journal as often.  Maybe it was because we spent so much time together that, besides school, I had little time for anything else?  Maybe it was because I was so happy that I didn’t feel the need to pour out my soul in a journal entry?  There certainly weren’t any more lonely nights at home with nothing to do but vent through my journal.  Regardless, I’m disappointed in myself and wish I could recall specifics more readily (I’m getting old).  Here’s what I do recall…

Valentine’s Day passed and the pressure to propose grew with each day.  For the most part, things continued to go well with Cheryl.  We spent most of our free time together and even some of our studying time.  I always looked forward to meeting her for the Tuesday devotionals.

Cheryl still had feelings for her missionary.  She would get these letters from him and I could just tell she was torn between me and him.  One time she got this package from him of little ducks that when you pulled a string would kiss.  She went on about how cute that was for a while.  The whole thing made me sick.  Things would be going so great and then it was like she wasn’t sure and really missed him.  It was a difficult time for me.  I couldn’t understand why she wouldn’t just end with the guy if she really wanted to marry me.  You can see why I was hesitating to propose. 

Cheryl was sending lots of mixed signals.  One day things could be great and I would be convinced that she was over her missionary; the next and I was back to square one as she would seem withdrawn and lukewarm.  Cap all of this off with my secret disapproval of couples that got engaged too quickly and I was in a quandary.

Maybe I was stalling so that everything would be clearer.  Cheryl couldn’t get any closure on her missionary until we were engaged.  I couldn’t propose until I got closure that he was no longer an issue.  This dilemma was never directly brought up in our conversations.  Instead, we would react to each other’s seemingly bizarre behavior.  I remember distinctly a few heated discussions while on walks.  Neither of us could express what was wrong.

Around this time I decided it would be good to introduce Cheryl to my Grandma Harding.  I had always promised my Grandma that I would let her meet Cheryl before I proposed.  I called my Grandma and she invited us up for dinner that weekend.  She mentioned that she also wanted to invite my sister KenseyKensey that if she wanted to invite Austin he would have to drive.  Pathetic.

We actually had a very nice time with Grandma and her husband Max.  Cheryl looked great and was very sweet.  After a great dinner we played my Grandma’s favorite game of Rummikub.  Later my Grandma did call to give her official approval of that “darling” girl Cheryl.   (Fun fact: Kensey ended up marrying Austin as well.  My Grandma met two eventual new members of the family on the same night!)

Still, the tension that we weren’t officially engaged just kept building.  I knew I needed to do something so one evening after work I stopped in at Sierra West Jewelers.  I learned all there was to know about diamonds including the 4 C’s: the cut, the color, the clarity, and the carat weight.  I didn’t find a style that I loved, but I was ready to break down and make the biggest purchase of my life.

Problem was, I didn’t have any money for a ring.  I barely could afford to pay for food and rent with my job let alone put down a few grand for a ring.  It was at this point that I turned to my parents for help.  Of course, when I told my dad he had to grill me on if I was really ready to get married yada yada.  I told him I was and asked him to come down to Sierra West.  He wanted me to explore buying the diamond from some friend who could get a deal.  He also wanted me to try out a jewelry store of another family friend where my Grandma bought a lot of her jewelry.  I had little room to argue and agreed to meet him up in Salt Lake later that week.

Disregard my ill-advised outfit, see those little guys in the back?  Duckpins.

The next dilemma was how I could be gone for 4-5 hours and Cheryl not be suspicious?

Recitations

I'm desperately trying to upload one of the cutest videos ever filmed.  But Blogger struggles.

This last Saturday was crazy.  Part of the craziness included not one, but two recitals.

The first was Bryce's dance recital.  We were a little embarrassed because for the first 2/3rds of the show, Bryce was THE ONLY boy.  He was originally in it with one of his good buddies.  But the good buddy dropped out.  Leaving Bryce and the girls.

And lots and lots of pink and black lace and frillies.  One of the moms even asks that they do one photo without him since he isn't wearing anything of the sort.

He might be in a dance recital, but he's still a boy!

That fact doesn't stop them from presenting him with flowers at the end.  See how thrilled he was about receiving them?

If I smile, will you stop taking pictures?!

And this should be where you get to see the adorable clip of him doing his dance.  So.  Stinkin'.  Cute!

But you don't get to see it because I tried all day and even part of the night yesterday to upload it to no avail.  Does anyone have any helps for how to get videos on Blogger?!

Moving on.

Next on the docket was my pretty princess's recital.

Sadly, most of my photos were blurry.  Still struggling with my camera.  But here she is introducing herself and her piece:  Lightly Row, a Folk Song.

One of her buddies (the same one who was supposed to dance with Bryce, incidentally) played right before her.  Can you believe how tiny they make these violins?

She played really well, but no matter where I took a picture from (and believe me, I ran all over the place during that brief little song), I could not get her face.  I think I would have needed to be sitting right under her violin to get a facial shot.

And I didn't even try to upload the video of this because this time we remembered the video camera and took the video with that.  And it is old school, as in "not digital", so I'm not even going to attempt figuring out how to put it on my computer.  Let alone, Blogger.

The crazy thing is, that was only a fraction of all we did on Saturday.  One or more of us also:  hosted a brunch (complete with homemade cinnamon rolls), attended a friend's baptism, went to a birthday party, hung out at the Children's Museum while said sibling attended the birthday party, ate, napped, took dinner to friends who recently had a baby, and ate again.

'Tis the season!