Tuesday, October 30, 2007

You have no idea

Adding #4 to our family hasn’t been a dramatic change. I’ve had an easy recovery and Hannah is an easy baby. She still sleeps most of the day. Picking up Asher from school every day is probably the hardest part of having four children. But I have a gripe about going out in public with four children. Not to brag, but I have really great kids. I think I do anyway and that is all that matters in this scenerio. EVERY time I’m out with my children, even when Asher is in school and I just have the 3, I get so many negative comments. I can not tell you how many times I’ve heard the comment, “You have your hands full!” while out with my children. People ask me if I’m done yet, people tell me 2 boys and 2 girls is a good place to stop. People suggest that I probably don’t want to have the next one too soon. What? My demeanor is such that people don’t usually talk to me when I’m out by myself. I’m pretty shy and I mind my own business and I think I send subconcious signals for people to leave me alone. But when I have my children out for some reason people feel compelled to make comments… And very seldomly are they positive. I do get the occasional “You have beautiful children” from the older folks. Maybe because they are from a different time when a family of 6 was more common. But this is also the age of TV and how many shows are there on TLC about large families? What kind of things do you hear when you have 10 or 17 kids in tow? Two moms were waiting to pick up their kids outside of school when I rolled up with Hila and Gabe in the stroller and Hannah strapped to me in the Bjorn. They had a whole conversation to each other about my family before asking me how many I had in school. I told them and they said, in a condescending way, “More power to you.” I don’t think I’m being overly sensative. If the comments were meant to be encouraging I think I’d feel that. So I’ve been trying to come up with an appropriate response. Something that says, “Don’t you dare feel sorry for me. I love what I do, and these children are amazing!” without having to say all that. So I’m thinking next time instead of smiling and nodding I’ll say, “You have no idea.” with a smile and be on my way. I do love what I do. And that doesn’t mean that its easy and blissful every moment. But the moments that count are truly joyful. I feel extremely blessed. I just wish that everyone else could see that.

Monday, October 29, 2007

Things I love about October

I was actually cold for the first time this weekend! I actually had to put on a sweatshirt. Horray! The weather here in NC is always strange. It is cool today, my toes are cold. So since it is finally looking and feeling like fall, I thought I’d make a list of things I love about fall. In no particular order…

1. Candy corn. I don’t know why. Its kind of a gross candy, but in the fall I just can’t get enough of it.

2. Wearing sweaters/sweatshirts. “Sweater weather” is just so refreshing and cozy. Plus its good for when you just had a baby and the flab is still hanging around.

3. Halloween. Halloween is the gateway to all the best Holidays. Once Halloween is done, time speeds up until Christmas.

4. Apple Cider. Yum. And what an awesome smell!

5. The state fair. Okay, I didn’t love it enough to wade through the lines, park and hike the children up to it. But I have the fondest, most nostalgic feelings about the fair. This year we made it up to just outside when we saw the crowds, changed our minds and went to a $1.50 movie instead.

6. The livestock at the state fair. I love looking at all the cows, goats, pigs… not the fowl so much because they stink. But they make me feel like I want to be a farmer…although I’m way more of a city girl than I thought!

7. Fall Festivals. I’m an equal opportunity fall-festival-er. I loved the little one they had at Asher’s school. And the ones they do at church (as long as I’m not in charge of organizing them ;) And I love the street fair they have in Southern Pines where BJay recently ran a 5k–go B!

8. Carving pumkins. This has only gotten better with kids!

9. Halloween parties. Love them, love people who throw them. Love hearing my children explain to me what apple bobbing is!

10. Fall colors. I love wearing them and seeing them in the trees. Nature is amazing.

11. Gift planning. I am definately a gift giver. I LOVE giving gifts, making gifts, wrapping gifts, planning where to buy and how much to spend on gifts. About Halloween time I’m making my lists and checking them twice. Love it.

12. Size 24 mos courderoy pants. LOL. This one won’t last forever, but pulling out all Asher’s old 2T winter clothes was so fun this year. And seeing Gabe wearing them was even sweeter. What is cuter than a 2 year old boy in plaid shirts and courderoy pants?

*13. Chicken Pants. I had to add this one. You’ll see when I post the pictures of the kids in their costumes!

Horray for fall!

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Hila's Photo Essay

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I turned Hila loose with the digital camera and I was pretty impressed with her work! I didn't crop any of these. She even figured out how to make a video of herself.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7511382268342619543&hl=en]

Thursday, October 25, 2007

7 days until I go under the knife

I’m trying to remain calm about my thyroid surgery next week. At first I was just worried about leaving my baby over night. Now it looks like I will get to go home from the recovery room if all goes well. So I’m hoping all will go well. We are blessing Hannah that Sunday so it better go well. The Dr. said that the biggest complaint he gets is that its hard to turn your head while driving. Any prayers would be much appreciated. I have always felt that everyting was going to be fine. But there are always the lingering doubts and concerns.

Not enough pictures of baby Hannah

My poor little girl doesn't have many pictures of her yet. The ones I have are all of her sleeping. Which is really all she does right now. As soon as I can catch a good smile I'll post it. Her smile is super cute, she's been smiling in her sleep since she was born. sleepinghannah2.jpg

Asher's Kindergarten parade

BJay got an okay video of Asher coming down the isle, but the flash was off on the camera so we didn't get any good pictures of him not singing with his class. For October 23rd it was incredibly hot and humid in the auditorium. There was a really musty smell too. Yuck. Instead of singing with the class Asher kept flashing us a thumbs up during the presentation. It was pretty cute.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4781141797124426446&hl=en]

Asher not singing

Before we got in the car I snapped a picutre of Asher in his storm trooper costume. Even though he had to "go" he still smiled cute for me!

Gotta go

Hila and Gabe

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Hila and Gabe escaped this morning to play in the glorious rain. I noticed that they had stopped watching Dora and went to the front door and and found them soaking wet stomping in puddles. We're in a pretty serious drought right now so the rain is welcome. The children did not want to come in when I called them. It was much more fun to run from me around the driveway. Once again I'm glad we didn't move into that house in Carthage on a busy street. I don't think Gabe would have survived. It didn't occur to me to take a picture of my kids misbehaving. But as soon as I rounded Gabe up and dried him off I laid him down in his bed and tucked the comforter all around him. He was so pleased he didn't protest his nap as he usually does. He just drifted peacefully to sleep. Sleep on a rainy day has to be one of the finest luxuries in the world.

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Tuesday, October 23, 2007

I have a new Nephew!!

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My brother is a proud new daddy.

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Jacob Alexander Juett was born October 17th, weighing in at 7 lbs 6 oz. and 20.5 inches long. The new family is doing well and we can't wait to see them this Christmas!!!

Guess Who?

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I couldn't leave the girls out. Hila or Hannah? We twisted Grumpa's arm both times!

Monday, October 22, 2007

Asher's first day in Kindergarten

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I need to get better at editing my pictures before I try and post them. They are always too big. Anyway I'm just goofing around to figure this out. I love this picture of Asher though. Its hard to believe he's in Kindergarden already.

Guess Who?

chocolatebaby21.jpgwho is this?

I was going through some old picutres and found someone who looked familiar. Guess which one is Asher and which one is Gabe?

Things worth writing about

I have always thought of myself as a writer. Ever since I started journaling at age 8. Unfortunately I am very limited in the English language, which is also the only language I know. I think my limitations with English made it impossible for me to ever really understand the other languages I’ve studied. Its humbling to figure out that you aren’t really good at the thing you imagine yourself really good at. So I guess I’m saying, don’t expect propper grammer, word usage or spelling. Speaking of, its really fun to go back and look at things I’ve written before. Things that I thought were important enough to hand write or interesting enough to save in my outgoing email to other people. I guess a lot of it is self congradulatory. And maybe there isn’t anything wrong with that. Because I’m also pretty good at recalling things that I’m not proud of. And things that are down right embarassing. Its healthy to laugh at yourself while primarily representing yourself as an absolute genius. I think. Anyway I was thinking of things that I wanted to write about. And one thing I’ve been recently congradulating myself about is how I’ve improved as a homemaker.

In the car the other day I said to BJay, “Remember when our room used to be a mess all the time?” It seemed to me a very distant memory. But then he reminded me that it was less than a year ago that our bedroom was such a mess that a dirty diaper sat on our wood floor so long it actually stained the wood. If only the new owners of our house knew that, right? Ha ha. And then I was reminded of when we were first married and the Bishop of our ward called to ask if it was alright if he came by for a visit. We said sure, and then spent every second scrambling to clean up until he got there. Our solution to the disaster that was our tiny apartment was to pile everything into our comforter and throw it on our bed and close the door to the bedroom. This worked out just fine until the Bishop asked to use our phone…and the only phone we had was a corded phone IN our bedroom. So I feel okay congradulating myself for my recent improvement in homemaking. I no longer sweat when someone drops by unanounced. That is big. And not only is my bedroom clean and my bed made every day. My kids rooms are clean too. And what is the difference? Mostly I think, I just decided I didn’t want to be that person anymore. I just didn’t want to be the messy house, messy car kind of person. Also my mother in law gave me the book The Joys of Homemaking by Daryl V Hoole. The book was inspring in a very common sense kind of way to me. So one of my new hobbies is organizing. Plus I went through a very hardcore nesting phase when I was pregnant with my 4th child. I made up all kinds of charts and schedules. I learned a lot of common sense things about homemaking I had either ignored or never understood before. I’m definately not “there” yet. I have tons of room for improvement. But I feel like I’m a changed person. And I’ve grown. So yay for me. I’m 30 and I just figured out how to keep my house clean. Now to tackle the next self-improvement goal on my list…