Friday

We've had a good week this week, although we are all tired and glad that it's the weekend. 

1-A typical day this week has been: Wake up bright and early, try to convince Lydia to snuggle in our bed for just one more minute, David gets ready while I make him some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch, David heads to work and Lydia and I try to entertain ourselves for hours on end. We do a pretty good job until about five or five thirty and then we struggle a bit - usually Lydia watches some Daniel Tiger while I make dinner. David gets home around seven-ish. We eat dinner, play with Lydia (who is SO glad to have daddy home), then scripture/song/prayer before bed at 8. By the time I get back downstairs after rocking Lydia for a minute and putting her in her bed, David already has his work computer out and set up on the coffee table and is working away. I might pop a bag of popcorn and grab a water bottle from the fridge before I come and snuggle up next to him under a blanket. I watch the Olympics and he works until I fall asleep. He wakes me up around eleven and we move upstairs where we get ready for bed. I'm asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow (whether David has finished getting ready for bed or not), and David crawls into bed with the iPad and takes a few minutes to read some articles on ESPN so he can wind down for the day. I can't believe what a hard worker David is, he works so hard the whole day and I'm pretty much the only one that complains. It's been a hard week - and it's pretty similar to the week we had before and the weeks that are coming in our future. I know that we will make it through, and this summer we will be loving all the time we get to spend together, but right now it's a little... exhausting. 

2-On a happier note: This week we bought a membership to Thanksgiving Point. It's basically unlimited access to a whole bunch of activities/facilities that are super fun for kids and I already know that it's going to be worth it. Lydia and I went to the farm with the Coopers on Monday (Presidents Day) and we loved it. Lydia was running around scream-giggling because she was so excited. She loved the goats, and the chickens, and the cows. She was so excited about the horses, until it was actually her turn to ride one of them and then she freaked out. In retrospect, I should have done more to prepare her (talk her through the process, and explain that when the other kids were riding she would get a turn to sit on the horse and that I would be there with her the whole time), but she was just so excited I didn't think about it. As soon as I set her on the horse she lost it. She was crying and wanting me to pull her off, so after the first circle we made a quick exit. As soon as I set her back down on the ground she started laughing and talking and I swear I could hear her saying "Did you see that? That was awesome! I rode a horse. I'm awesome!". When Ashley asked her if she liked riding the horse she responded "Yeahhhh." To which we both laughed because she obviously did NOT love riding the horse. But she did love following Carson around and playing with Elsie in the little worm-tunnel at the "Soil Market".  

3- On Presidents Day, two years ago, Ashley texted me and invited me to go fabric shopping with her. We had chatted a few times because David was the Coopers visiting teacher, and because his companion wasn't able to go with him I had tagged along. We seemed to have a few things in common (like we were both teachers, we were both pregnant with baby girls, and we both liked sewing, among other things). I went and had a nice time, but even then I could not have known what a great friend Ashley would be in my life. We love this Cooper Family. (Also, I love this picture and think that it is equally  1-funny that none of the kids are smiling even though we were having a great time and 2- amazing that both Lydia and Elsie are both looking at the camera, because that is quite a feat.)

4- One of my friends posted this poem on Facebook yesterday and it really touched me. It's from 'The Parent’s Tao Te Ching' by William Martin. 

"Make the Ordinary Come Alive" 

Do not ask your children
to strive for extraordinary lives,
Such striving may seem admirable,
but it is a way of foolishness.
Help them instead to find the wonder
and the marvel of an ordinary life.
Show them the joy of tasting
tomatoes, apples and pears.
Show them how to cry
when pets and people die.
Show them the infinite pleasure
in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them.
The extraordinary will take care of itself. 

I think that this is so beautiful that it makes my cry. It gives words to something that has been flitting around my heart for a while now. For surely, there is marvel in this ordinary life that we lead. And all the seeking after the elusive "extraordinary" should not overshadow the greatness that is life itself. 

5- I was feeling a little crummy this afternoon, overwhelmed with several different things, and so I ate ten jet-puffed marshmallows. Surprisingly. I feel better. 

Dear Thursday,

Dear bubbie wra-writs,
Thank you for bringing so much joy to my sweet little girl. She loves you and your floppy ears and long whiskers. Thank you for bringing so much joy to me, because listening to Lydia say "Bunny Rabbits" makes my heart melt and brings a smile to my face. You are my favorite animal right now.

Dear Thanksgiving Point,
I don't know why it took us so long to get a membership, but I'm so glad that we did! It's only been a few days, but we've already visited several times and Lydia can't stop talking about all the "anmals (animals) at the farm". Already I feel like the individual membership is a steal and feel a little guilty for how much use I know we are going to get out of it!

Dear McArthur Homes,
I can't believe it's been a year since we moved into our house! You've been nothing but wonderful to us, and I'm especially appreciative that you've been so diligent about completing the list of "warranty items" that I sent to you the day before we hit our year mark. I probably could have re-caulked the upstairs sinks myself, but it makes me so happy that your technician came over and did it for us. (And guaranteed it took him a fraction of the time that it would have taken me.) You've taken great care of us and we love you for it!

Dear "Inspirational Facebook Friend",
I'm friends with you on Facebook because I think it's neat that you live in South America and have an uplifting and inspirational company filled with humanitarian work and motivational tools. I also appreciate the occasional "Do something extraordinary today" posts.  However your recent posts about "fitness" have both offended and upset me. Not everyone needs to run marathons to the top of unknown mountains in order to be extraordinary. Weight doesn't determine value. I, and those around me, are doing the extraordinary every day. We are raising, and being a part of, healthy and happy families. We are shaping the future. That is incredible - and a number on the scale doesn't change that one bit. Please continue to use your influence for good, instead of this recent "body-shaming" stuff.

Dear Eide Bailly,
Thank you for all of the opportunities that you give our family. We appreciate having a job, having decent health insurance, and all of the other benefits that you provide. However, I would like to take this opportunity to mention that "busy-season" with Eide Bailly is more busy than it was when you were HBM. Counting down the days until the craziness starts to ebb. (39 in case you were wondering.)

Dear Sam's Club,
Now that we have become a 2-gallon of milk kind of family, the fact that you have $2.00 milk endears me to you eternally. Also, the giant (and I mean giant) jar of pickle spears that you had for $5.00 is now sitting cozily in our fridge. Didn't you know that they sell regular jars of pickles for $3.50? Lydia and I have already enjoyed several pickles and look forward to chomping through the rest of them. You are officially our favorite store to visit. (This may also be due to the free grilled cheese sandwiches and applesauce samples.)

Dear Winter,
I know that it's still your season and that more snow is right around the corner, but thank you for letting us have this little glimpse of Spring! It's warmed my heart and lifted my spirit and I now feel that we will be able to make it until May.

Dear 2014 Sochi Olympic Athletes,
We admire your talent and work ethic, and have enjoyed cheering you along each night after David gets home from work. We've loved watching everything from Ice Dancing to Super-G skiing. Even your commercials have us (and by us, I mean me) in tears. (I'm looking at you P&G.) Congratulations on a job well done, all of you!

Happy Valentines Day

Our Valentines was pretty laid back this year. We had a pre-valentines lunch date in Draper on Thursday because David has been working at a client close by, but is headed to a client further away on Monday - so we had to take advantage of how close he was! Valentines Day was the perfect excuse. Lydia and I headed out just before noon and less than fifteen minutes later we were picking up David. It was incredible and I loved it so much! We went through the drive through at Carl's Jr and then headed to the Costa Vida down the street. Lydia had fallen asleep in the car and was giving David some good loves while I was ordering my food (Sweet Pork Salad anyone? Yummmm.) We had a nice lunch and we loved being able to see David in the middle of the day!

We decided to extend our celebration and stopped at McDonalds for some ice cream. I told David that I wanted a kiddie cone, and he didn't believe that they would sell me one. But I made him ask and they totally did. 25 cents baby! It was awesome. Our ice cream was the perfect end to our little date.  

Our Valentines budget had originally been decent, but after we had to order two blog books instead of one it was had pretty much decided not to do any gifts for Valentines Day. Technically our budget was $5 per person, but we had been really busy this week - and we'd both said that we were going to keep it low key this year. I decided that I'd make him a yummy heart-shaped breakfast, and then last minute I picked up a $5 gift card to Sonic because I wanted to make him happy. Then the morning of Valentines Day, I came downstairs to find a little wrapped package with a super sweet note attached to it. Among other things, it said "I love that you love to introduce me to new things that I love, but never knew about. I love when you introduce me to new books that we love. And, I love when they turn those books into movies because I love to cuddle with you." My present was the DVD of Enders Game, which is one of my very favorite books. We didn't see it in the theaters, because we were waiting for it to come out on DVD so we could watch it on our clear-play. I was so surprised and excited. I hope that the movie lives up to our expectations, but mostly I'm just grateful for a boy who knows me so well. 

I watch Carson and Elsie on Friday mornings, and so I decided to make the kids a special Valentines breakfast of pink french toast. Lydia and Elsie loved it - but Carson couldn't get past the red color. We colored Valentines and frosted some cookies for the Coopers to take home with them. 

Something that we really like to do is celebrate days/events that are meaningful to us. We try not to get too caught up into the commercialism of Valentines Day - because I really chafe at the idea of having to celebrate "love" by spending lots of money on one day of the year. However, I do love David - and I love Lydia - and I love celebrating things that are special to me. Valentines Day holds a special place in our hearts because it is the day that brought us together. It's the day that some sweet boy at Utah State saw me on campus, listened to my grump-filled spiel about Valentines, and (instead of running away as fast as he could) made me brownies and came to my shift at work in the Sci-Tech to keep me company. It's the day that we first connected, and it marks the day that we started down the path to falling in love. So commercialism aside, this really is a day that should be circled in a heart on our calendar. I think that I'll tell our children that we are celebrating the day, because it's the day that Mommy and Daddy first fell in love, and that everyone else just wants to celebrate, too. Haha. (Oh, and I should probably mention that this Valentines Day is the 1-year mark on closing on our house! I can't believe it's been a whole year.) All in all we had a very relaxed, but very happy, Valentines Day celebrating the things that are special to us. 

Baby Camille

Yay! This week Lydia and I were able to go and visit this sweet baby girl and her pretty mama. 

We loved meeting Camille and spending time with them. Lydia especially was smitten with "Baby Mill", as she called her. She kept running into whichever room Camille was sleeping in and just wanted to look at her. "Baby" she'd say. And I'd say, "Is that baby Camille?" And she'd say "Baby Mill". It was so darling. I can't believe how much bigger Lydia look in comparison to Camille.

We also went grocery shopping with Jenna and Camille. Lydia and I ended up with a bag of "Grapples" which are grape/apples or grape flavored apples. They were very tasty and Lydia loved them. I also love how Lydia says apple: "Ah-mmm". I don't know exactly how that translates to apple, but I love it when she says "I want a ah-mm" or when she points out an apple in a book "Ah-mm!"

We love these two and wish they were closer. I can't believe baby Camille is already 4 weeks old, but at the same time I had to keep reminding myself that she hasn't been here longer than that. We missed David on our little road trip to Idaho Falls, but it was so nice to be able to spend some time with these girls. Can't wait to see them again soon! 

Lydia Elise: 20-21 Months

Someone around here just turned 21 months old. This girl just keeps getting cuter every day!

Stats: Wears size 3 diapers during the day but we've had to transition her up to size 4 diapers at night because the size 3 diapers aren't big enough to handle overnight anymore. She still only has four teeth (there is one tooth that is threatening to break in, but it still hasn't completely made it in yet). She's starting to grow out of her 18 month clothes, but the 24 month clothes are still much too big. 

-This girl is so smiley and happy pretty much all the time. I really can't believe how good of a baby she is. (I guess I can't say baby anymore - she doesn't have any baby left in her at all.) The only time she is ever really sad is when she has a diaper rash, but even then as soon as she gets some Desitin on her bum then she cheers right up. It's amazing how happy she is. She's started saying "Cheese" everytime I take out the camera and grinning up at me. I love it.  

-Loves milk. She always asks for water (wa-wa) and then when you fill her cup with water she says "Noooooo. Mik!" while singing milk. She drinks like four cups of milk a day. She is also a really great eater. She loves fruit more than anything. (This month is was bananas. "Nana, nana?" She couldn't get enough.) But she also eats most other things really well. The only things that she doesn't eat are the things she has a hard time with (like lots of bread, or broccoli stems).

--Loves playing on her trampoline and will try to convince anyone who comes to visit to come and jump with her. She will come over and grab you by the hand and pull you to the tramp to get you to jump with her. I love how much she loves it.  

--So inquisitive. She pulled off all the marker lids earlier and I let her play with them and some ice cubes in a tray of water. She couldn't figure out how the color was coming out of the lids. I loved watching her explore and learn. I wish I knew of more activities like this, because they only last for a couple of minutes and she's never as interested the second time. But she does love to learn.  

(on the note of being inquisitive, she sat and played with this golf ball for over ten minutes, letting it balance and fall off the edge of the chair then jumping off to get it and climbing back up)

 -Her Chicka Chicka Boom Boom book is one of her favorites. She bounces around the room while you read it and whenever you say "Boom boom" she yells "Booo Booo!" Some of my other favorite things: when you get to the middle and say "The whole alphabet up the...." and pause, she'll say "Oh no!" (which is the next line, but she says it SO cute). Then at the end of the book when there are all of the letters listed, she can point out the "Y" and say "whyyyyy", and point to the "D" and say "Dante". We spell all sorts of words by pointing at the letters, and it's fun to see her picking up on them. 

--She went through a phase when she didn't want to sit in her high chair. She freaked out as soon as we'd try to put her in there. So we spent a week or so letting her stand at the table to eat her food, which was so funny and made her seem so old. However, we are back to sitting in her high chair and I think we are all happy to be back to normal.

--She's getting good at making Block Towers. She makes them on the floor that are as tall as she is. She makes them on the trampoline. She makes them on the entertainment center. She's such a good builder.

-We have a great bedtime routine. It involves reading a billion books (or two books a billion time), reading our scriptures, singing a song, brushing teeth, saying a prayer, filling up the sippy cup with water, and snuggling with mom or dad in the chair before laying her down in her crib.

-When she wants some raisins or pretzels, she brings me a little orange tupperware bowl (it's only about the size of a quarter) and asks me to fill it. It's too cute not to let her have whatever she wants. So when she grabs my hand and pulls me into the pantry with a little bowl in her hand, I pretty much always give her some raisins. 

-For some reason she loves to color on her doggie. If I turn my back for a minute and she finds a marker - it always ends up on him. Luckily we haven't had a huge problem with her coloring on walls or anything, but something about this dog begs to be colored. He's got sharpie on his nose, Crayola markers on his head (washed out fine when I was giving her a bath one night), and today I found dry erase marker on his ears. I know that I need to figure out a way to keep the markers away from her, but she can climb so high and likes to color on paper - so they sometimes get left out.  

--She said her first sentence! We were at my parents house getting ready to Matthew's homecoming and she pointed to the Pink Salad and said "I want to try it". It was crazy. Now she's putting words together all the time. Most of the time her sentences starts with "I want". Like "I want milk", or "I want nana's", or "I want a treat" (that's a problem one). I can't believe how much she's talking. 

-Other things that she's saying so much: Up, Okie Dokie, Church (while pointing at a dress), Grandma (she's only said Papa for a long time, so when she said Mama for grandma it was really exciting), Horse(She says "Nay" for horse, it's darling), Necklace (I didn't know that she could say that until we were walking through a store and she pointed to one and said "necklace"), happy, and help. She will also repeat basically any word back to you. It's amazing. 

-These are her two best friends. She mostly plays with Carson while Elsie does her own thing, but she gets the most excited when she see's Elsie. They really are best friends.

 -Lydia has started jumping down the stairs. Step by step she jumps both feet at a time. She's so silly and a little dangerous. I try to make her hold my hand whenever she jumps, but she's got really good balance so I tell her to stay safe - but I am secretly proud of her ability.

 -She's been fighting her sleep schedule like crazy. I don't know what to do. She was taking an early nap around 9:30, then pushed it back to ten, then eleven. She acts tired, but then she just hangs out in her bed for an hour talking and crying. I think we've finally got it figured out and I'm putting her down at one even though she is acting tired earlier. I have to wait until then. But if I wait too long, then she doesn't sleep because she's too tired. It's a delicate balance.  

-She loves loves loves reading books. We read a lot of books. My favorite is when I walk into a room and see her reading a book all by herself. Even if she's just looking at the pictures, it makes me happy. 

-Speaking of books, This is one of Lydia's favorite books. It's called "Little Blue Truck". We read it probably 20 times every night. The funniest thing is that the book is about a little blue truck, but her favorite part of the book is the dump truck. She fill flip through the first half of the book until you get to the dump truck and then she just wants to sit and talk about the dump. We talk about the rocks, and the rain, and the dump truck. She loved it so much that we decided to buy a little yellow dump truck for her to play with. We gave it to her when she was reading her book and she was so surprised! She's vey well rounded in the things she likes to play with: dolls, shoes, blocks, balls, trucks, cars. She loves it all.

  

-When you ask a question, she says "Otay." Which is perfect when you say "Will you come with me?" or "Go grab that toy", but it's so darling when you say "Do you love your dog?" or "Do you want some dinner?". It's not completely inappropriate, but just a slightly different word than "yes". It's cute.  

--Lydia really likes to help me make breakfast in the morning. Specifically, she loves to help crack the eggs. I think it's cute, and I'm impressed with her coordination.  She will "crack" the egg on the edge of the bowl, then squeeze with all her strength to break the egg. Once it is smushed, she will pull the two pieces apart and let the egg fall into the bowl and put the shell back into the container. So cute!  

--She's such a sweet, happy girl and we love her very much. Happy 21 Months Lydia!