The Beginning of October=The End of Our Schedule

Over my girls' fall break my mom came to visit. She almost didn't come because my grandpa had a small stroke that is typically indicative of not good things, but he seemed to recover remarkably well. He was eating and talking by the time my mom left. In fact, the day she left, he told her in his grumpy/joking way, "What does Phoenix have that I don't?"

I wasn't really expecting my mom to come, but happy she could be here. It does kind of throw our schedule for a loop though. Even our non-schedule schedule gets put on hold if that makes sense. It is fun though. I am glad she spurs us to do things we wouldn't typically do. Like go all the way up to Scottsdale to go on a nature walk.

We also went to a fun park and rode a train, carousel, and had a picnic. More typical for me is go to the gym, go grocery shopping if needed, put the baby down for a nap, do school/home work with the girls, do the home maintenance work (dishes, laundry, meal prep), and try to do some kind of at home activity if we have time. Very little, if any, of those things get done when my mom comes to visit.

These are the things memories are made of though. I never, ever would have driven through downtown Phoenix during rush hour to go to some Japanese friendship gardens. It was fun to try a new experience though. There was a large pond under construction, but there was a smaller pond that had koi. My girls really enjoyed feeding the fish and weren't even nervous at the writhing, churning mass of fish that were trying to eat the food right from their hands. They tried to drop the food right into the gaping mouths. Yuck. I am definitely not an animal person.

Aside from the bubbly almost foam, it was really quite pretty. I gotta wonder what was in the water though to make it go like that.

Daddy wanted to feed Holly to the koi. :) See the mouths open wide?

As we continued around the pond, we came to a musical performance. It was very ethnic sounding, and at one point the main guy paused the music and played his didgeridoo. It is a long wooden pole that is definitely unique. We stopped there and had a snack while we listened to them.  

Holly loved the snacks.

The Japanese gardens was a beautiful place, with my beautiful girls.

The next day we went to a plant sale at Boyce Thompson Arboretum. It was a little more than an hour's drive away, and we had to take two cars, but it wasn't so bad. The plant sale was surprisingly cheap, and despite the craziness of taking all three kids to a plant sale with my mom we made it through. My mom does love her plants. We were pretty interested in it too. We ended buying a few plants, and my mom bought some for our yard too, including a fig tree. We will have to see what that is like. We ended up getting about 10 plants total.

After the sale we walked around the arboretum. It was lovely! We had a picnic and then went to the butterfly garden.

Group Shot!

There were three areas with different types of climates shown--dry, moderate, and tropical. The palms were in the tropical zone.

At some point in the garden where they were showing all of the plants from Australia (that apparently grow well in Phoenix), Miss Holly fell asleep in the stroller. That really was a blessing as it allowed us to spend a few more hours there. If she hadn't we would have had to take her home in order to get a nap.

This was also in the wet zone.

This cactus house was one of my favorite places. Ever since moving to AZ my appreciation for cacti has skyrocketed. That being said, I didn't even really like them before. ;) There are so many cool varieties out there though!

The cool cactus house!

What a cool place! We definitely will be returning sometime. My mom offered to buy a year pass, but I didn't see us going back quite that often to justify it. It was amazing though and definitely a return trip is happening!

This was in the children's garden.

School Activities

Since this year I only have one little baby at home while Miriam is at Kindergarten, I have a goal to be at more school activities. This is great in theory and even in practice. It was just crazy for a week or two in September when everything happened all at the same time. Two assemblies, two after school activities, and two classroom volunteer days, and a day to get trained on how to do art masterpiece. All in the same two weeks. Other than that crazy couple of weeks, it has been great.

At Eliza's fall party there was an apple theme--apple games, snacks, and crafts. It was really fun. Some of those kids in the second-grade gifted class are smart! I am sure that they all are super smart, but I was wasted at the apple connect four game by a couple of them.

Eliza wants to say: We had this craft. The parents had glued a little brown tree on a piece of white paper. We got Q-Tip's to dab shimmery red, gold, and green paint on the paper. We did this to make apples because it was an apple themed party. I also dabbed some of them on the bottom so it would look like apples had fallen down. They're also the color of fall leaves, so I thought that some of them should be fall leaves.

At Miriam's school we had an after-school sock hop. This meant a fun dance party in 50's style clothes. I actually don't really know what that entails, aside from poodle skirts, so this what we came up with. It was pretty funny/horrifying to see all the kids do the "Whip and Nay, Nay" dance. 

Miriam wants to say: We danced a lot, and I even got some root beer float with chocolate ice cream inside. My teacher, Mrs. Bowlin, even danced with me.

I also attended a cheer assembly for Miriam. They are held to celebrate kids that are exemplifying the character traits for the school. This month's character trait was caring, but on her certificate, Mrs. Bowlin said Miriam does all six character traits. That was a good mom moment. (No sarcasm this time.) It was a surprise to Miriam that she received an award. As an added excitement, her name was pulled in the drawing for all of K, 1st, 2nd, grades to select a special prize for her class. She picked to have extra recess time. Pretty awesome.

Miriam wants to say: I got an award, and my ticket got pulled out. If you get your ticket pulled out you get to pick a surprise.

I also attended Eliza's Patriot Day assembly on Sept 11. It was a great assembly with patriotic songs sung by the school. It was great to be able to see that.

Eliza wants to say: It was fun learning all the songs for the Patriot Day Assembly. The easiest one was "The Grand Ol' Flag." Ms. Mulkey (our music teacher) says that because it has actions. The two other ones we learned were "God Bless the USA," and "The Star Spangled Banner." "The Star Spangled Banner" was hard to learn because it has a very, very, very hard melody. We practiced and practiced and after the assembly I could sing "God Bless the USA" while I was vacuuming without a single mistake.

Apparently, I didn't take any photos of the after-school party at Eliza's school. It was a movie night on the field. They showed Zootopia. My kids had seen this movie before at John's parents' house in July, but they still wanted to go see it. We actually volunteered to help the PTO at the candy booth. There was a choir performance, food to buy, free popcorn, and beach balls. It was a really fun event. My friend Margaret was in charge of the whole event and even though it turned out great I could tell she was really stressed, for which I can't blame her. Unfortunately, even though they had seen the movie before my girls got too nervous watching the movie on the dark field and wanted to go home part-way through the movie. Actually, Miriam ended up staying with friends, but Eliza and Holly were not having fun so they came home with me. Much more calm at home. Funny kids. 

This is a photo of them last night, getting nervous during a Magic School Bus episode.

During this time, at church they had the Primary Program. The Primary Presidency had the kids make an invitation to give to a friend to invite them to come to the program. Eliza meant to give hers to her friend Madelyn, but she never got a good opportunity to. Miriam actually did give hers to her friend Nadia at school. And surprise, surprise she and her mom came to the program! I only saw them at the end of the meeting as everyone was leaving, but we chatted in the foyer for a few minutes after. I was so touched they came. The girls each gave a great little talk towards the end of the meeting. They also sang their duet as the last musical number. It was the same song we sang in Stake Conference.

I am glad Miriam had the courage to invite her friend. Sometimes that can seem so hard, but I shouldn't be so nervous to talk people about the gospel.

Miriam got ahold of the camera feature on the phone and took some photos. Cutie pie.

Selfie by Miriam!

Artistic photo by Miriam!

Having Fun vs. Having Joy

It is conference weekend and this morning President Russell M. Nelson spoke about joy. He reminded us that we can find joy in the Savior no matter our earthly circumstances. While he was speaking, I started to consider the difference between having joy and having fun. Earlier in my life I thought those words were interchangeable. Now I find that joy is something much more precious, even though these pictures and events that I am recording are mostly of us having fun. I find joy in the seeing the innocence of my children, like Miriam making up songs and dancing or just dancing to the music in the store. I find joy in seeing their delight in small things--like gluing random stuff together to make a creation. I love it.

We did these creations at this IDEA Museum. We visited this museum in August when my mom was visiting. My mom coming to visit us is getting harder and harder as my grandparents have increasingly failing health. It is so sad to see them decline so much from what I remember them being. My grandpa is in a Veteran's home near my parents' home. My mom takes my grandma over to visit him every day. The reality of what happens to an old person as they near death is shocking to me. I have never really been close to someone who has gone through this process before. It is a stark contrast to my little girls that are overflowing with life and energy.

There was a fun baby section of this museum that had a socks-only area with a smaller area for just babies. I went in with Holland and got scolded several times by a little boy who kept reminding me that it was only for babies. 

There was a fun green screen where the backgrounds could be drawn. There was a black light room, lots of crafts, and even a clothes designing area. What a fun day!

Also while Grandma was visiting, we watched my friend's little girl and, because my mom was here, we even ventured out. My mom also made a matching quilt to the girls' beds for Holland. My mom definitely never goes halfway at anything.

Happy birthday to the best daddy in the world! 33! We love our birthday traditions, as well as some goofy faces. Those cheesy church commercials are right--family really is about time together. "Isn't it about ... time?"

John enjoyed his bump on the head.

Miriam and I making goofy faces.

Because of John's birthday we used his free birthday burger and went to Red Robin on the last day of the month. :) The kids were thrilled to each pick out their own little meal (we really don't eat out very often). Also, when did they get big enough that we have to buy something individually for each of them?? It was freezing there so they were snuggling on the bench. Holly is my sweater (as in she sweats a lot) so I hope she was fine in her summer romper. She really loved playing with the wet wipe we gave her to play with. Towards the end though the girls were all getting crazy, so I had to leave with them while John paid the bill. Crazy kids. They really do bring us so much happiness and joy.

Holland at 15 Months

Our sweet baby is just changing so fast. Her newest tricks are walking, talking and waving. She took her first real steps on August 4, 2016 at 14 months old. Within two or three weeks she was only walking. It is adorable. But darn, she gets around fast! I had to break out some shoes for her, which I can tell she still thinks are fun/weird on her feet. I let her walk around outside in the front yard yesterday and immediately she went for the saguaro. Earlier that day we went to the park and the only thing she was interested in was the parking lot. I have a feeling she is going to keep me on my toes.

Unfortunately, we really don't have a baby friendly yard. There are just plants and gravel. She stands at the sliding glass door to the yard and whines to go out, but there is nothing for her out there. Poor thing. We keep thinking about grass, but real grass sound hard and costly and fake grass sounds substantially costly. Hence we still have gravel.

Holland's first real word is fan. She loves pointing to the ceiling and identifying a fan whenever possible. She said it consistently for the first time on August 23, 2016 at 15 months old. Since then there have been other new words. A couple of favorites are mama, dada, and whoa. I think she is starting to say hi, Jesus, story, and sister, but it might just be my imagination. One way or another though, she sure likes to babble to herself. What a sweetie!

Another favorite trick is waving. This is too cute for words. She will get the biggest grin on her face and use both hands to wave at Daddy when he gets home. Other people get a small one-handed wave and a smile. What a doll.

We are also working on teaching her how to give kisses. So far she will only give kisses when she feels like it, which is not very often. There have been a few times though when she will go for it. They are pretty juicy! She puts her mouth to yours and right before she makes contact she sticks out her tongue to give you a lick. It is hysterical. She is more likely to blow kisses than give real kisses. She does this at Miriam when we drop her off at school (when she isn't too mesmerized by the school buses). She also waves bye-bye at her.

Another funny one is that she doesn't say no-no yet, but she does shake her pointer finger to mimic no-no. I didn't realize that we even made that gesture at her, but it would appear to be so. The hilarious part is that when she does something naughty (like pull things off my nightstand while I am taking a shower) she'll come up to me afterwards and shake her finger at me with a smile. She knows she did a no-no, and she was just informing me. :)

 

Holland still loves stories, and it is darling to see her 'read' them to herself.  One of my favorites is when she hears music or we say 'dance, dance' to her. She bounces her arms (particularly her right arm). What a delightful cutie pie!

The Beginning of a New School Year

Sometimes I feel like this is all a fantasy. I am going to wake up and still be a teenager--busy with school, giggling about boys, when college, career, marriage, and children seem nothing more than far off dreams. I can't believe I am really in the thick of it. These sweet little girls are my children! That handsome, selfless, smart man is my husband! When did this all happen???

Well, I just blinked, and two of my little baby girls are now in school. Kindergarten and Second grade. School starts unusually early around here and Meet the Teacher night was in July! I put Miriam in the half day Kindergarten, and Eliza is in the self-contained gifted class. That means that they are attending two different schools. Ironically neither of my girls attend the school that we live in the boundaries of. Although, it is actually less crazy than you would think. Eliza catches the bus early, but because of where the bus stop is located (across a busy street) I have to drive her even though it is nearby. Since everyone has to be in the car anyway, it is pretty simple to drive Miriam to her school.

Right before she started Kindergarten, she finally finished the Reading Lesson book. It only took about two years! :) She is a good little reader now, but she doesn't really love it as much as Ellie did. It seems like as soon as Ellie got a little bit of ability and independence to be able to read she just took off. A month or two later and she was reading through chapter books. Miriam does like stories and feels a lot of pride in being able to read, especially scriptures (kind of has a bragging problem actually) but she doesn't love it like Ellie did. I do catch her every day or two sitting down looking at books, and I think, reading them to herself. But I think she still considers it a chore when I sit down to have her read to me. I try to do this every day and if the book is too long or wordy she wants us to trade reading every other page (which I do, I want her to love the stories, and not get too bogged down or overwhelmed in the task of actually reading all of the words. I hope this is the best choice!). Miriam knows almost any given basic word, and longer words she can guess at pretty well, but she gets really frustrated/defensive when I tell her that she read a word wrong or to try to sound it out. She'll just argue with me that she read the word correctly. I just want to ask her if she thinks I am lying to her! Despite the frustration I am proud of how much Miriam has improved on her reading. I hope one day soon she can come to love it.  

I pick Miriam up about 11 and then Eliza arrives home on the bus about 3. You would think that this would be a lot of time, but I am surprised at how fast it goes. If we go to the store, fix, eat and clean up lunch and put Holland down for a nap, that only leaves a few minutes to do things like read a book and do a few pages of a workbook (one that is more at Miriam's level than what she is doing in school). I still enjoy the one-on-one time with her though. The picture below shows that my five-year-old, Kindergartener still rides in the 5-point harness. We all have to fit in the Corolla, and I don't think we could fit two booster seats next to each other. Even if we could squish them in, there would be no way that Miriam could do the buckle with so little room between the seats. Even though we have a particularly narrow convertible car seat (the one Miriam is in now) I am still surprised at how little space Eliza has to work the buckle to get in and out. Still she manages it, much to my relief! Miriam can buckle herself too (but not unbuckle which is kind of awesome!) so I just can't regress and have to go back to buckling her.

On the first day of school we took some photos of the girls (see below) and John drove Ellie to school because the parents are allowed through the gate and onto the playground the first day. He said that she was pretty excited to show him around the playground. 

I went with Miriam and took Holland. On the drive to school Miriam told me, "Mommy, if you die, I want you to give me poison too so I will die with you." What a sweetie! At the end of the day she told me, "Mommy, I might call you Mrs. Bowlin (her new teacher) because I think about her so much" Also, "I might forget about you because I am in school now." Okay, thanks kid.

She does love her new teacher though, and school in general. The half day class isn't self-contained anymore, which is sad. But the teacher makes it really cute talking about the kids as "half-day friends" and "full-day friends." Miriam has told me numerous times how she wishes she was a full-day friend. Too bad kiddo. 

So Holland and I have a little bit of one-on-one time too. Often, I am at the gym while Miriam is at school and when we get home Holland needs to go down for a nap, but on the days that the girls have ballet after school at the gym I exercise then and we have some play time (or grocery shopping time) in the morning. This baby loves, LOVES books! It is by far her favorite activity. She is also being such a little walker and talker. I will have to do a post about that very topic later. She discovered how to climb on top of the kid chairs, much to my horror. She also recently discovered toilet paper. It's fun. She is so much more cuddly than the other girls were at this age. I love it. She will actually rest her head on me when she is tired or just feeling cuddly. It is so sweet! I am so glad I get to have some time just Mommy and Holly. 

I am glad that Miriam and Eliza are such good friends! I wish they could be at the same school. Sometimes it feels like my heart is being torn in two different directions, but I know that they are both in the exact situations that I would want them in. Half day and gifted. They both seriously love their teachers. For the first week it almost seemed like they were competing to see who loved their new teacher more. I am so glad that there are such nice teachers out there. I know there are some bad apples thrown in, but I truly believe that most teachers are in it to help children, which is wonderful.

First day of school!

Eliza has always enjoyed school. She has always had sweet teachers, but this is the first year I have really seen her light up about what she is learning. She comes home practically glowing! She is almost giddy to show me all of the things they are doing at school, which I have to say is a lot! I was blown away at curriculum night with all of the things they are doing. Both years before this I felt like I needed to supplement her learning at home in order to make sure she was continuing to learn and be pushed a little bit. I definitely don't feel that way this year! She is doing so much and by some miracle her teacher does it in a way that makes this huge leap in curriculum, work, and expectations a fun and exciting adventure. I was told by several friends how amazing this particular teacher is (Mrs. Whigham), but I was still floored at how sweet and loving this woman is, how much they are doing in the classroom, and what an amazing environment it is for my Eliza. I feel so grateful she gets a year with this teacher.

Happy back to school, girls! I have to laugh at how all the school supplies in Miriam's backpack makes it so huge against her tiny body. Kindergarteners are so tiny and cute! My Eliza is a doll too. I miss them so much during the day, but I feel confident that they are in great school situations, which makes it so much better. I love you girls!

Too many school supplies for a tiny Kindergartener!