A Day Of Joy, Magic . . . And Chaos

(to be sung to the tune of "I'm Gettin' Nuttin' For Christmas")
“We received Nerf guns times three,
Chaos is everywhere!
Matthew went on a candy spree,
I find I just don’t care!
We got several noisy toys
that are loved by all the boys,
plus a thousand other joys.
Calm hasn’t got a prayer!

Oh, I’m going crazy for Christmas,
Kevin and I are real tired.
I’m going crazy for Christmas
Because all my children are wired.”


But seriously, it probably should have been Nerf guns times five. Suctions darts are too much fun for even a relatively sane adult to resist. Matthew also loved his little Lightning McQueen and friends (check out the OCD toddler lining his cars up) and his shake and go Lightning McQueen from Auntie Rachael.


Nathan was super excited about his omega sized Nerf gun and was thrilled to get some new playdough (I threw out all the old, dried out stuff when we moved).



Daniel’s rock hammer (Santa has no idea what a huge hammer this was when he ordered it. He was imagining an itty bitty rock hammer, not a rock pick.) and unbroken geodes were a big hit as well as his rocks and minerals books and some magnifiers for looking at his rocks.



And all the boys absolutely love the lap quilts that Kev’s mom made for them. As soon as Matthew had his unwrapped he got on the couch, laid down with a pillow, covered himself with the quilt, handed me a book and asked me to read him a story.




By evening the boys pretty much had the aiming bit of the nerf guns down. Matthew was just about the funniest ever. Check out his face:



Between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day we got to visit with all of my family and most of Kev’s and had a marvelous time. (Thanks Connie and Arrin for bringing your boys out to visit with us. Our boys love spending time with them! And so do we!) Daniel survived the season with his sense of all things magical pretty well intact. Matthew was sad to discover that our elf has flown back to Santa and is already hoping to see him next year. Nathan is thrilled with his Nerf gun even though it isn't something remote control, which is what he asked for. It was a good holiday.

Deck The Halls

One of the projects that has helped fill the boys' off-track time has been making Christmas tree ornaments out of salt dough. We started them the evening of the Sunday Daniel didn't get to see the Mo Tab concert. He was pretty bummed and I figured we needed something to perk him up. And what's better than pounding play dough? The boys loved rolling out the dough and cutting their shapes. Matthew's favorite part? Holding a big stick.


After the ornaments were dry, we got the paint out. Three boys+twenty-five paintbrushes+ a dozen colors of paint=bliss! Daniel and Nathan had an especially good time mixing their paints to create just the right color.




After the paint dried, we sealed them with a clear coat and tied on the ribbons. At last they are done! Seriously, this activity kept them busy for a week and cost us next to nothing. Everything we used (except the clear coat, two cans of which got lost when we moved) was already in the house.

(Matthew's Ornaments-he was sleeping when we took the pictures)

So be on the lookout. Some of you very important people may be the proud recipients of your very own salt dough ornament!

Mixed Blessings

Nathan's latest appointment with the eye doctor was this morning and after how the last one went, we were all a little anxious. Nathan desperately wants to be done with the patching (although most days he is still a real trooper) and Kev and I were afraid that he was losing some of the progress that he has already made. The good news (at least from our perspective) is that he is a little bit more nearsighted in his left eye and his right eye is now a bit nearsighted as well. That means he hasn't lost any progress, he just hasn't been wearing the right prescription in his glasses. The bad news (from Nathan's perspective) is that the doctor doesn't want to change too many things at the same time lest the weak eye regresses so Nathan will still be patching four hours a day. Six weeks from now when his eyes have had a chance to adjust to his new glasses and assuming his lazy eye is still as strong as it currently is, he will go down to two hours of patching a day.

The Pros And Cons Of Sledding

Pros:
1. The boys have discovered that our side yard is just steep enough that they can sled down it.
2. The can sled to their hearts’ content while I stay nice and cozy inside.
3. It is neither steep enough nor long enough to work up too much speed.
4. When they get cold hot chocolate is only ten steps and two seconds away.
5. It’s fun!

Cons:
1. It is neither steep enough nor long enough to work up too much speed . . . except when it is icy.
2. No brakes.

(Although it doesn't show up very well, if you look closely you can see the big old bruise on his forehead. And the huge scratch in his right glasses lens. And all the paint scraped of the bridge of his glasses. This is the reason we buy his glasses at Shopko. They have a rockin' replacement plan.)

(The big old goose egg that accompanied the big old bruise.)

3. Apparently children are not inclined to learn from their siblings' mishaps.

His Personality More Than Makes Up For His Stature

Matthew is pretty dang funny. He makes me laugh quite regularly. Lately a lot of his funnies have been language related. For instance, last week when Kev asked Matthew to bring him his scriptures, Matthew promptly responded with, "Certainly!" Earlier this week he was playing with a toy shovel and suddenly started talking about his shovelrino. After we made gingerbread boys, he chomped the leg off of one, danced it around on the table, and cried out, "Ooooh! My leg comed off!" And he had a super funnybone moment while we were celebrating Daniel's birthday with Kev's parents.

Kev's mom found a recipe for a raisin cake that is completely Matthew friendly without making any changes. So she made it for Daniel's birthday. None of us had tried it yet, so I asked Matthew, "Should we see how the cake is?"

Kev then said to Matthew, "Should we ask it? Say, Cake, How are you?”

Without even a pause, Matthew replied, "No! He’s not boy! He’s cake!"

The rest of us sat in total complete silence for a few seconds while we processed what he had said and then their was great laughter.

Need a laugh? Just have a conversation with Matthew.

Daniel's New 'Do

Doesn't he look great?


(But seriously, this is an example of some mighty fine hat head and the lights on the Christmas tree added the perfect final touches!)

Oh, What Fun It Is To Slide In A 107 Horse Chevrolet

This morning Kev and Daniel were invited to go downtown to see Music and the Spoken Word and the following Mo Tab Christmas concert with Kev’s parents. Alas, it was not meant be. The roads were super slick due to last night’s snow and headed out of our neighborhood Kev turned the steering wheel of his car and the car did not turn. The brakes were equally ineffective and the car slid into the curb. Luckily, there wasn’t an enormous amount of speed involved and Kev got the car back on the road and continued on his way. Unluckily, right away he noticed that something wasn’t right. He pulled into a gas station and discovered that the rim on one of the front tires looked like this:


He swapped it out for the spare and headed home, only to have the tire of the spare pop off the rim before he could get here. They tell me that even in the snow metal on asphalt creates sparks.


Once they got close to the house, Kev, Daniel, Nathan, and some complete stranger who lives a couple of streets from here (He was on his way home from work and saw a need so he stopped. Nice, huh?) shoveled the driveway (our driveway is a little bit on the steep side and there was no way a tireless car was going to get up it in the snow) and Kev and the friendly neighbor pushed the car into the garage while I steered.

Kev and Daniel were both pretty disappointed about missing the concert. I don’t think Daniel’s face could have been any sadder if someone had told him Santa was dead. But we were all very grateful because it definitely could have been worse.

Moral of the story? There really isn’t one. It’s just another saga in our chaotic life.

Carb-buffet

Apparently our new ward does a Christmas breakfast instead of a dinner each year. So this morning we hauled everyone out of bed and trekked to the church for our morning nourishment. People brought breakfast baked goods in all varieties: coffee cakes, doughnuts, danishes, cinnamon rolls, caramel pull apart bread (yum!), and muffins in several varieties, including dairy-free-egg-free blueberry muffins (these were mine of course, brought so Matthew would have something to eat and to their soy-based credit, they were one of the first things to completely disappear). There were several fruit offerings and the ward provided hot chocolate.

There was a program of some sort: I hear there was a dance-off featuring leaders from all the different organizations, but we missed that portion while we were doing our tithing settlement and I find I'm not overly sorry about that. I have a really hard time watching people make fools of themselves. I get so embarrassed for them that I can hardly stand it. Anyway, after that portion we sang a few songs and welcomed Santa . . . who had a scheduling misunderstanding of some kind and ended up being much thinner and younger than usual (he couldn't stand up or his pseudo belly fat would have dropped down to his knees and his pants probably would have come off-not the kind of Santa that is usually welcomed at a family affair). Nathan got in line to talk to Santa right away, Daniel hung back for a bit (one of his friends said Brother R. was Santa and Daniel was checking in with me . . . I told him not to listen to everything his friends say, but the doubt is already there so he's more skeptical than in the past) and Matthew was just plain dubious about the whole thing. Apparently Nathan wants a remote control car (Santa has something else picked out for him that will hopefully be just as fun), Matthew wants toys (easy enough!), and Daniel's wish list is about five miles long (to be completely honest, I don't think Santa will be supplying a single thing on it since he was finished with his shopping about three weeks before the list came into existence, but Santa is pretty sure Daniel will like what will be coming).

(Notice Matthew's death grip on the marshmallows-one of the ladies on the activities committee lives across the street from us and knows about Matthew's stuff so when there were unopened bags of marshmallows left over, she offered it to him)

Overall, it was a pretty fun morning, the exception being the moment when one of the older ladies in the ward (all her children are grown) came and stood by me with Daniel in earshot and asked who was playing Santa this year. My response? "I think Santa is playing Santa this year." I thought she had gotten my enormous hint, at least she reacted like she had, but them she made another comment about someone else who would make a good Santa. Please, make my doubting Daniel even more skeptical. Go ahead. I love it. Needless to say, I politely made my exit, taking Daniel with me. We'll just have to wait and see how long Daniel can hang on to the magic.

How To Build A Snowman When The Snow Won't Stick

A Sign That Perhaps I’ve Been Listening To Too Much Christmas Music

Daniel actually used the phrase “Oh, by golly” in a normal conversation. (For those who may be confused, check out the lyrics for “Have A Holly Jolly Christmas.”)

A Long, Drawn Out . . . Birthday

Birthday celebrations have a tendency to last for days around here and Daniel's ninth was no exception. On his actual birthday we celebrated with our little family: cake, ice cream and presents. He received the board game Battleship from Nathan and Matthew and a puzzle from Kev and me. As per his request, his big birthday present from us will come sometime around June. With his birthday so close to Christmas, it is really nice to get something in the middle of the year. My birthday follows close on the heels of Christmas and this arrangement was really nice when I was a child!

Two days after his birthday we celebrated with Kev's parents: cake and present . . . only one, but it was a huge freakin' Lego set almost bigger than Daniel! He loves it and spent three days building just the first of three options.


The Saturday after his birthday was his celebration with his friends. He wanted a Lego themed party and I just have to say that it was one of the easiest and cheapest parties I've ever put together. Everything we needed for all the games was already sitting in bins in the toy closet. One of the best games was giving each boy identical Legos and five minutes to build a bridge and then stacking cans on the bridges to see whose would hold the most.


It was fun . . . and loud! Then we had more cake and ice cream. (Random comment: Daniel's retainer is the exact same color as his Lego cake.) Thanks to all his cousins and friends who helped him celebrate his special day. I just love that his cousins are always the first ones on his guest list!


The Sunday after Daniel's birthday was the shin dig with my parents, siblings, etc. We had even more cake and ice cream and another Lego cake. Devon, the cousin that Daniel always gets to share his birthday with, was laughing (in a good humored fashion, not mocking of course) because it took Daniel about four tries to get his candles blown out. Darn asthma.


So the week long birthday is finally over which is always a signal to us that it is high time to get down to the serious business of getting ready for Christmas!

Two Peas

Matthew has hit the Thomas the Tank Engine phase, which is swell for us considering the toys are well-made and durable (translation: slightly on the pricey side) and we have about fifty billion of them hanging around from when the other boys were in this phase. The only things that did not survive were the clothes, which were (literally) worn to rags. So today Matthew got a brand new pair of pajamas, something that in all reality has never happened to him before. And he was uber excited.


And his favorite part about all this (besides the Thomas bit, of course)? Now he is "Juuuuust like Nathan!!"

When We're Helping, We're Happy . . .

I clean the bathroom on Mondays and today as I finished scrubbing the toilet, I turned around and saw this:


It's super nice to have such a good helper (even if he isn't old enough to use actual cleaning products).


And just a note about the shoes: my bathtub is so big that I have to stand inside it to clean it. So I picked up a pair of $3 waterproof gardening clogs for just this purpose. Matthew knows those shoes only come out when I clean the bathroom.

Saying "Halloweenie" Is Just Fun

When Daniel was nearly two, I made a monkey costume that both he and Nathan wore with glee.


At two years old, this year was Matthew's turn to be a monkey. What we did not know was that for some reason, Matthew is diabolically opposed to the monkey suit. He freaked out every time we tried to put it on him and would rip it off his body at the first opportunity. The one time we managed to get the hood on him, he laid down on the ground with huge tears rolling down his face and played dead monkey.



So he was a headless monkey for the trunk or treat at my parents' ward where the acquisition of loads of junk food distracted him from the trauma of the monkey suit.


Daniel dressed up as the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. I just have to say that as boys his age are moving more and more towards violent or gory costumes, I am thrilled that he is still charmed by calmer things. Plus, I'm a huge Wizard of Oz fan anyway.

Nathan opted to beg for treats dressed up as a treat. He attended the festivities as a bag of jelly beans. Can I just tell you how much I love a $2 costume?


As is tradition, they were able to meet up with a bunch of their cousins at the trunk or treat, by which time Matthew was so done with the photo ops.


After the trunk or treat (it was in the afternoon this year, go figure) we came home for a spooky dinner: mummy dogs and skeleton bones with a side of monster eyeballs and witches brooms.


After dinner instead of forcing Matthew back into the monkey costume, we asked him if he would rather wear something else. So he opted for the firefighter costume (even though it is about four sizes too big) and was about fifty million times happier.

This year was the first time my boys have gone trick or treating in the neighborhood and they were very excited. Nathan could hardly stand to wait as Daniel put his costume on.

Matthew, in traditional Matthew fashion, decided not to wait.


It is probably a good thing we had an extra hour last night because they were all so wired up when they got home that it took a while to get everyone calm enough to sleep.

And one last photo before I leave all this Halloweenie stuff for another year: here is Daniel sporting his prize from the one game played at last nights' Halloween party.

I Wonder If This Is Why People Get Drunk

Is it really just something to break up the boredom?

Tonight was our ward Halloween party and the entire thing consisted of one game for the kids at the very beginning and then one of the ward members acted as DJ and played music. That's it. Sum total of activities. The kids were all running amok because they were all sugared up and had nothing to do. It reminded me of a junior high school dance where there are like three people dancing and everyone else is just standing around awkwardly. Kev said it reminded him of those Stake Stand Arounds that were called dances when we were teenagers. I've never wanted to see a rousing game of pumpkin bowling more in my entire life. The one high point of the evening was the boost to my ego when my cookies were among the first to disappear. Here are the few we had left at home.


So for all those folks who serve on the activities committee in my previous ward, you guys rock!

If Brothers Gotta Hug, What Do Sisters Gotta Do?

Last night Kev and I went to the temple and as we reached the end of the session and everyone pulled out their little papers with names on them, the women sitting next to me tapped me on the arm and directed my attention to her paper. The name of the woman on her paper and the name on mine had the same last name and were born in the same place within just a few years of each other. We think they were sisters. It was pretty cool to think that perhaps these sisters were sitting together on the other side of the veil while the two women standing as proxies were sitting together in the temple.

It made me think about my own sisters, all of whom I've had the supreme pleasure of sitting next to (or in the very near vicinity of) in the temple. (Watch out guys. This could get mushy.) I'm one of those people who not only gets to be with these sisters forever, but I'm actually glad about that. We spend time together not just because we have to or because we're supposed to, but because we actually like each others' company. Although we all have our moments, for the most part we get along really well and we have a million and one inside jokes to prove it.

Patti and I are fairly close together in age and we spent much of our growing up time together. We weren't always bosom buddies (ask her about her purple worms), but by the time we were teenagers we got along pretty well. We did things together, talked frequently (I'll bet my parents just loved the long distance bills we created while I was in college), and although we are very different in personality I think we understand each other pretty well.

Rachael and Esther are enough younger than me that they were still in elementary school when I went away to college. So imagine my glee when I moved home after graduation and had an opportunity to get to know my now grown up younger sisters. There were good times and much laughter. One of my very early dates with Kev was to one of Rachael's choir concerts. Esther rode with us and only freaked out a little bit when Kev drove down the road backwards. But he was on the correct side of the road for the direction he was going so we weren't actually in much danger! Now Esther is the one I can talk education with. She is my inside source for book orders and if I ever go back to teaching, I'm going to steal about a million of her ideas.

And as for Rachael, before the four and a half years I spent in her basement apartment, her apartment was kitty corner across the parking lot from mine for nearly two years. We saw each other nearly every day for over six years and we didn't even kill each other! And once I moved, I discovered that I kind of missed being able to just knock on the door and go up to see her. I mean, my boys so don't care how cute my new shoes are! I actually have to wait now to share the cuteness!

So I count myself pretty lucky to have three sisters that I actually consider friends. I'm sorry to all of you who have ever experienced all of us together. We can be a bit . . . spazy. Even our mother has a tendency to roll her eyes at us. But I wouldn't have it any other way. So here's to my sisters:

Where Popcorn Poppers Come From

(Matthew was perfectly willing to sing this for the camera only after I told him we would send it to Auntie Esther.)

Status Quo

Nathan finally got to see the eye doctor today and the news was not quite what he was hoping for.  His eye tested at 20/25 today, which is just a tad worse than last time, but his good eye was also 20/25 so the doctor was not concerned.  He said that if we were to come back tomorrow it would probably be just fine.  But because of that, Nathan will still be patching four hours each day.  He wasn't thrilled.  In eight weeks we will go back again, recheck his prescription to make sure it is still accurate, and go from there.

Pumpkin Fun

Last night we got around to decorating the mother lode of pumpkins we scored last Monday evening. The boys opted for paint while I (with my extraordinarily limited painting skills) took up the knife and carved. Obviously this was a very serious task that took great concentration.

Here is Nathan with his finished pumpkins.

Matthew was being Nathan's Mini-Me, just like always. And the oh-so-original pumpkin was my creation in paint, hence my option to carve.

Daniel is holding one of his creations and the other is on the table to his side.

And here he is showing off Kev's Pump-witch.

My pumpkin was sporting bats.

Obviously our ten bucks got us more than one evening of entertainment!