what I've heard all day

Imagine the following sung in a little three year old sing-songy voice.

Baa baa black sheep, have you had any fur?
Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.
One for the master,
One for the lame/main/mame
(What's the girl called again? Oh, dame?)
One for the dane,
and one for the little boy who lives on the lane.

the breakthrough

Before you watch this video, you have to understand that Alexis is not a natural water lover. Because we swim so much she has learned to love it, but she has always been afraid of getting water in her face. She (up until yesterday) used to freak out if she got the slightest bit of water on her face, which obviously meant no dunking or jumping or splashing. Then yesterday something clicked. I guess she realized it's not so bad, that swimming is in fact more fun when you aren't afraid of water on your face. So what you are about to watch is really amazing for her. Really really amazing and I still can't get over it. After she learned to do this she did it for the next hour, over and over and over again. And I am beyond proud.




{Sorry if the video is grainy or the sound is bad...Jeremy wasn't here to do it for me}

weekly stuff

I needed to get a post up before life gets really busy around here, which I anticipate happening this weekend. Have I ever mentioned how I hate being busy? I'm a laid-back kind of lady and hate having a million things to do, but that is life, isn't it? Most of the stuff is a fun kind of busy anyway, so I can't really complain. Especially since I've already been swimming 4 times this week, and we'll go again in a few hours. My life really is hard.

We'll start with the most exciting part of my week. Alexis had a MAJOR swimming breakthrough yesterday, of which I have video. I'll get that up today before we go camping...hopefully. But here's a hint:
I turned 26 this week, which Jeremy likes to remind me is closer to 30 than 20. He usually stops once I remind him that he turned 29 last week. That's a whole lot closer to 30.
Tyler has taken to sleeping with small objects, like bouncy balls. He closes his little fist around it and drifts off to sleep, awakening occasionally, screaming like he's seen the devil himself, because he can't find his ball which is RIGHT NEXT to his leg.

Jeremy dug up our backyard to move a water box, a project that ended up taking a lot longer than he anticipated, and involved spraying both of us in the face with dirty water when one of the pipes came off. As a result we now have an "L" shaped section of dirt and dead grass. I take it as a sign of love that he put my initial in the lawn.

And today we're babysitting Jeremy's 5 year old cousin. He asks a lot of cute questions, like "will Tyler be sad if I play with his toy?". This question is nice to hear because 1) it involves actually caring about others feelings, and 2) it wasn't "will Tyler be mad and hit me if I play with his toy?" which shows he's not scared of Tyler. Any kid not afraid of my son is welcome anytime.

Stay tuned for a video of Alexis and her awesomeness.

more Rhino adventures

Yesterday we had the chance to go out in the Rhino again for part of the day. While it was nice and hot here, the trails up in the mountains were quite a bit cooler. Which is really good because we haven't yet made some sort of roof for the kids in the back!

So we drove up to this lake called Forest Lake, which was really pretty. I guess it was extremely appealing to Tyler because he just stood and stared at it for the longest time. Then we looked over at him again later and saw that he was standing IN the lake, shoes and all! Next to the lake was a pond that seemed to call out to men and their four wheelers: "drive through me". Every group of ATV's that came through there had at least one (if not every) person that had to drive through it. And everyone else would watch and laugh and then pull them out when they (as they usually did) got stuck. One guy got stuck far enough in that his friend that went in to get him out got stuck too, so they had to have a third guy help him. While this was entertaining to watch I had no desire for our Rhino to go through it; fortunately Jeremy didn't express any either, probably because he knew I wouldn't have liked it. But his friend who came with us tried it, and got stuck twice. Unfortunately the second time did something to his Rhino, so he had to head home and get it taken care of.

After that we found a nice place to stop and eat lunch.Jeremy and I both seem to agree that our favorite part about having this Rhino is not actually all the four wheeling stuff (though that is fun!), but it's the places we can go with just our little family and the peace and quiet we can enjoy. We love going up to where there aren't a lot of people or noise. Which I know you can get by hiking too, which we also enjoy doing.

Then, on the way back down, the kids proved to me that if they are tired enough, they really can sleep anywhere. Even on a rocky, bumpy road.

In case of an emergency...

I set a goal for myself (which I usually don't do because it's so annoying to have to actually do something productive) to have our emergency kits (72 hour kits, if you will) ready by the end of June, and it looks like I'll actually make it! Geez, that sentence had a lot of annoying side notes (sorry about that), and was probably hard (or impossible) to get through (if you even kept reading).

Despite being reminded constantly to get these kits assembled, I am just barely doing ours. And while it's been very good to do, I've got such a crazy imagination that it's also been a little stressful. I mean, when you hear emergency, what do you picture?? Probably an instance like New Orleans where there were warning signs and people had time to gather their things and leave in their cars. What do I picture? Some sort of alien vs. human warfare happening right outside my home that destroys everything in sight, except my family of four (sorry all you other people). After all the alien ships have left we'll have to dig our way out of the rubble, survey the damage and realize that civilization as we know it has been destroyed. We'll then grab our 72 hour kits and hop in the Rhino (the only other things miraculously untouched by the gunfire and bombs), and set out in search of human life. Something tells me that if that's what actually happens, our three days worth of food is just not going to cut it. Seems like I should also put some seeds in there and learn a bit more about horticulture just in case we find some fertile soil and have to start our own settlement.

Anyway, back to reality. So we've got our kits assembled, minus a few things that I'll hopefully finish finding next week. Alexis has been watching me do all this, and now "emergency" is her new favorite word. Like when we're at the pool and she tells everyone that "tomorrow we're going to have an emergency". Which means I've now got the job of trying to explain to a three year old what an emergency is without scaring her too badly. Remember the worm's house incident? She scares easily. So this afternoon after hearing the word "emergency" wrongly used about 100 times I sat her down and tried to explain. I used the example of an earthquake and how it might knock houses and buildings over, and then the grocery stores couldn't open and people wouldn't be able to buy food or clothes or water, so they should have some ready just in case that happens. After going through this whole spiel about earthquakes, her only question was "but if we're outside how will we change our clothes so people don't see us". So apparently my earthquake story didn't scare her, but my constant "don't show your underwear" speeches has.

So if you don't have your kits together, do it! If you're aren't worried about the aliens, at least do it so that if an emergency happens while you are in the shower, you have some spare clothes somewhere. You'll be saving me the trouble of explaining to my daughter why you're outside naked

my berry best friend

Since today is Jeremy's birthday and yesterday was Father's Day, these past two days have been all about him (at least as much as they can be when you've got a self-involved wife and two little kids), and I've been thinking about him a lot. There's so many wonderful things I can say about Jeremy, but instead I've decided to steal words from other people. So thanks to the awesome lyricists who write the songs for Strawberry Shortcake, this is dedicated to Jeremy.

You're especially special, there is only one you.
And if you were a crayon, they'd name your color true blue.
We'll be buddies forever, cause together we'll find,
Though we make other friends,
We two are still one of a kind.

You're my berry best friend,
You're my berry best friend,
What we have is so yummy that it's never going to end.
You're my berry best friend,
You're my berry best friend.

You're the cherry on my sundae,
You're the engine on my train,
You're the music in my laughter,
You're my sunshine in the rain.

When you put us together
We make up the perfect pair.
You're number one in my heart
and you're always going to be!

You're my berry best friend
You're my berry best friend,
You're my berry best friend.
You are
the best friend
to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

A lesson on proper bathtub attire

Yesterday I put Alexis in the bath in my room while Tyler was napping. However, he woke up earlier than expected, and since he loves baths I tried to hurry and get Alexis out before I had to endure too much whining from him. But to my surprise he didn't whine about getting in at all, so I quickly did something else for a second. Then I hear Alexis call, "mom, Tyler got in the bath!" He does know how to climb in the tub, but he doesn't know how to get undressed, which explains this:

If you can't tell, he's saying "cheese" as I took this picture. He saw nothing wrong with this. Here's a short video too.



I also have a HILARIOUS video of these two in the bath the other night, but since this is public and I'm not sure who reads it, and they are both actually naked in this one, I'm not posting it. But if you are a friend and are at my house sometime, ask me and I'll show it to you. 'Cause it's awesome!

Sappy

It's 1 AM and I should be sleeping; I sure wish I felt compelled to write at more convenient times! But I'm having one of those mom moments where you are filled with so much emotion that you feel like you are going to burst. So if you don't like cheesy posts about emotions, keep on moving, this post is not for you. And just a disclaimer, towards the end I sound like a hormonal pregnant lady, which I am NOT. Just normal crazy me.

Every night before I go to bed I sneak in the kids rooms and watch them as they sleep. I watch as their little chests rise and fall with each breath, and the way their eyelashes flutter lightly on their cheeks, and laugh at how they have their butts up in the air or the way they are posed like they should be on a lounge chair by a pool rather than asleep in their beds. Watching them rejuvenates me after a long day of their crying, or whining, or just being. However, lately after checking on them I find myself sad. Sad, because every day they change and get older. So then I start plotting up ways to stop time, which so far seems impossible. I'm the kind of person that's always anxious to move onto the next stage or the next thing, not because I like change, but simply because I worry about what that next stage is. Or sometimes because I think the situation I'm currently in can be improved. But now, with these kids, I don't want to move onto the next thing. I want Alexis to remain almost 4 for the rest of...forever, and for Tyler to be almost 2 for just as long. It's like I've finally been able to see what a great thing I've got here and I don't want it to be any different than it is right now.

In a little over a year Alexis is going to start kindergarten. She's going to enter a world where she thinks her friends and teachers are smarter than me, where Tyler is no longer her favorite playmate, where she stops hopping when she gets excited because other kids will laugh at her, and where she starts to feel annoying emotions like self-consciousness and embarrassment. A place where my voice is no longer the only one she hears. And when she's gone at school I hope that I remember the moments like today where the two of us curled up on the couch and looked at every single page of her princess look and find book, or how at dinner I convinced her that broccoli made her arms grow so she picked all the broccoli out of her pasta, quickly ate it and then asked for more.

Tyler has been sick since yesterday evening and tonight just as I was about to fall asleep he started crying, so I brought him into our bed and got him a cup of milk to drink. Then I laid there with him as he dozed in between sips, and stroked his hair and his little fat dimpled hand. And I tried to memorize the way he fingered the trim of his blanket that he loves so much, and the sounds he made and the way he holds his sippy cup so that the tip is barely in his mouth. And for once I didn't wish that he would hurry up and drink so that I could go to sleep, I didn't grumble about him keeping me up. Instead I said a silent prayer of thanks that I could lay there with him just a little more, that I could hold him just a little longer, that I could be his mom. And just when I was about to cry because I was so overwhelmed with gratitude, he reached his little arm up, put it around my neck and pulled my cheek next to his...just for a second. Then the tears came. And with them the realization that this constant state of tiredness that I seem to be in may or may not someday change, but my kids are ever changing, and since I'm helpless to stop it, I don't want to miss one second of it.

Dreamy

I've always had a thing for blond-haired, blue-eyed guys. Seriously, with the exception of one or two guys, every crush I've ever had has had the blond/blue combo. But, I think this guy takes the cake.

*sigh*

Now, if I could only get him to stop talking about trucks, and Rhinos, and balls and his dad, long enough to notice me.

I've got no creative title for our trip to Iowa. So there.

We're back after 8 days, 3000 miles, 5 states, every kind of weather imaginable, and 1 very full memory card. Our trip went well, but if I never ride in a car again it will be too soon. We drove to Iowa to visit Jeremy's family. While we were there Jeremy's brother graduated from high school, Jeremy went to Chicago for a Cubs game, Jeremy and I went to Nauvoo, and Jeremy's family packed up their house and moved to Utah. It's good to be home, though it seems we've brought some sort of cold-slash-major allergies with us. I had about 7 places to go today and here it is, 1:15 pm and we are all still in our pajamas. So much for being productive, so I might as well blog. We took about 150 pictures but I'll spare you and only share a few.

Here's a list of things I learned, realized, or remembered on this trip.

1. I am not a good night driver. Especially when it is snowing and the white drops of snow also look like the horribly faded white lines on the highway.
2. I hate the state of Wyoming and don't plan on going there ever again. We'll just skip around it if we ever need to head east.
3. When Alexis is sleep deprived she can throw some pretty horrible fits, but only for me.
4. Tornadoes can be pretty exciting to think about and entertaining to try and watch, but aren't so cool when they actually hit down in a town not far from you.5. When I move, I want to have a moving company do it for me.
6. When the Chicago Cubs win they fly a white flag with a "W" on it. Also, they sell ice cream in little plastic blue Cubs hats at Wrigley Field.7. Nauvoo is a very pretty little town, with a great spirit. Every member of the church should go there and experience it.8. I am not very photogenic.9. Tyler would make a cute farmer.10. The Midwest has too much corn on their hands. They've had to come up with new creative uses for it all.11. Mt. Rushmore is actually very impressive. In fact, the whole southwest corner of South Dakota is very pretty and worth visiting. We hope to go back and camp there someday.12. I like to climb stuff.
13. Donkeys really like Chicken in a Biscuit crackers. And they'll stick their heads in your car if you open your window.
14. My kids are very good travelers, and also very cute.
I hope this post was not as boring as I'm afraid it is. My head really hurts so this is the best I've got in me right now. I'm just waiting for it (my head) to explode and put me out of my misery. Or maybe I'll just nap.

Out of the mouths of babes

All About My Mommy:

Here's Alexis' answers to this new game of tag. I'm guessing based off the answers of #8 & #10, Alexis needs to get to know me a little better.

1. What is something mom always says to you? No (Jeremy answered this for her)

2. What makes mom happy? Um, of cleaning up.

3. What makes mom sad? Of being mean.

4. How does mom make you laugh? tickle

5. What was mom like as a child? uh, good

6. How old is your mom? 1

7. How tall is your mom? this big (held hands apart about as big as a kitten)

8. What is her favorite thing to do? uh, wash the dishes and do the laundry.

9. What does your mom do when you're not around? uh, I don't know.

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? laundry

11. What is your mom really good at? playing tea

12. What is your mom not very good at? go fish

13. What does your mom do for her job? i don't know. watch a movie!

14. What is your mom's favorite food? toast

15. What makes you proud of your mom? playing toy sports

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? Dora

17. What do you and your mom do together? we um dance around.

18. How are you and your mom the same? because we're twins with our toenails

19. How are you and your mom different? with nothing pink

20. How do you know your mom loves you? because

Alexis tags: Mason, Jackson & Dallin.