Take a Big Breath…

Today was the day Matthew switched from waffles with eggs to waffles with milk. Although the initial waffle with egg day was stressful for me, today was much more so. You see, when he was a baby, his reactions to milk were always much more severe than his reactions to eggs. In fact, the only reason I suspected he had an allergy to eggs was the fact that if anything containing egg went into his mouth, he immediately spit it back out. There was none of the raspy breathing, immediate mucus increase, vomiting, hives and accompanying mama panic that occurred when he came in contact with milk. Add to that the fact that percentage wise, there is a lot more milk than eggs in waffles, and I’ve pretty much been a big mother sized stress ball for the past couple of days.

We had a little hiccup this morning when, about ten minutes after his first tiny bite, he declared in a panic that his throat didn’t feel right. He said it felt a little tight, like there were too many people crammed into one room. That put me into a bit of a controlled panic as well. I say controlled because I was pretty much freaking out on the inside but trying to keep my calm but concerned mom face on the outside. Kevin, Matthew and I talked through everything, reassuring Matthew that if things didn’t go as smoothly as the egg waffles, everything would still be fine. Since there was no increase in severity over those next few minutes, we all opted to hold off on the Benadryl and see what happened with a bit more time. After another fifteen minutes or so, Matthew told us that the weirdness had passed, and everything felt normal. With a bit more discussion, he decided he wanted to give the milk waffles another try, so he took one more tiny bite and we waited.

There were no more things that felt wrong, so we kept going, one bite at a time with longer periods of waiting and smaller increases in serving sizes to play it safe. He made his way up to one full sized waffle by lunchtime with no more ill effects. So here’s the thing. He didn’t take any antihistamines last night so any reactions today would not be masked by Zyrtec. His seasonal allergies were so bad when he woke up this morning that the throat weirdness could have been caused by any number of other things. We just don’t know for sure. But in all honesty, I’m still feeling extremely cautious about the whole thing. With Labor Day being on Monday, we have two more days when he can eat milk waffles for breakfast and then be with Kevin or I all day. And all of next week he is planning to eat a waffle for a snack after school rather than eating them for breakfast and then heading off for an entire day away from the parental eagle eye.

At this point, I’m saying today was a cautious success, one that can turn into a full success with more time and more waffles. And I’m enormously impressed with the courage Matthew is showing with this process. He knows that he can stop at any time, but he wants things to go well so much that he didn’t let this morning’s initial scare deter him.

As for me, I just need to remember to keep breathing…

Kick Off!

Matthew has been counting down. To what, you may ask? Football season, of course! In particular, BYU football season. He’s always excited, but this year he seemed even a bit more excited than usual. I suspect it had something to do with the fact that BYU’s first game of the season is a home game against the U of U. And the fact that Kevin pitched in with my dad for season tickets which means Matthew would be in the stadium for the game. For the past few weeks, he’s been giving us the countdown down to the minute. And as the clock counted down to kickoff, he was texting the seconds right along with them.

Daniel has learned how football works and as such, enjoys it more than he used to. When he had an opportunity to go with Kevin and Matthew, he decided he would join the party, although I suspect he was more excited to see the marching band than the actual game. Nevertheless, three of my guys are sitting in the stadium and Nathan is watching the game at a friend’s house surrounded by his new Madrigal friends.

As for me, I’m going to bed. Kickoff was at 8:15. They won’t be home until the wee hours. I hope they have fun, but I’m looking forward to a full night’s sleep. 😉

Eight is Great! (Part 4)

Today was the last hurrah for Malia’s birthday. For lunch, Daniel and I were able to join her for the PTA sponsored Birthday Table at the elementary school. With the introduction of a veggie burger with high enough amounts of pea protein that they are causing allergic reactions in folks with peanut allergies, Carl’s Jr. is off Malia’s safe restaurant list. So Daniel drove out to Apollo Burger instead so that she could still have her traditional nuggets and fries for lunch. They were a bit on the soggy side due to the restaurant being a good fifteen minutes away, but Malia was not bothered. One of the things she has enjoyed the last couple of year is that Acie, one of her best friends, has a just birthday five days before Malia’s so she gets to kind of flaunt the “one friend or your parents can join you at the birthday table” rule and get the best of both worlds.

Happy birthday…again! Not every kid is lucky enough to get four separate celebrations.😜

Eight is Great! (Part 3)

Over the years, I’ve made a lot of boy themed birthday cakes. We’re talking trains, cars, airplanes, superheroes, dinosaurs, outer space, pretty much every typical boy thing. With three sons, it was kind of unavoidable. As such, creating some girly birthday cakes has been super fun. Making this year’s cake was just like one big long play date between me and my baking implements. 😉 And I completely approve of Malia’s flavor choices-vanilla cake with raspberry filling. Yum!

More important than all of that, Malia loved it. She was perfectly pleased with how everything turned out. My mom made fun cakes for me when I was young, and I’m so glad that this is something I can do for my kids. I enjoy it and having a one of a kind cake is one of the ways I can let my kids know that they are one of a kind as well. So happy birthday, Malia! I’m so glad to have another girl to help balance out all the boy stuff in my life!

Eight is Great! (Part 2)

In terms of a birthday party, Malia had very simple desires this year. She wanted to go swimming at the rec center. I was completely on board with that since it meant all I had to do was provide cake, ice cream and supervision. And Kevin ended up being the one to take the kids to the pool which meant that I was able to skip out on supervision and pick up the much calmer clean up duty instead.

Because we have limits on how many 3rd graders we can 1) fit in our car and 2) we can realistically keep an eye on at the pool, we told Malia her invite list was limited to five friends. When the appointed hour arrived, we only ended up with two-my niece Kate and Acie, a friend of Malia’s from school. Luckily for us, Malia was not disappointed in the least. In fact, she told me yesterday that if Kate was the only one who came, she would be just fine with that. Once again, love that my kids are friends with their cousins! One of the perks of having such a small group was that Acie and Kate warmed up to each other very quickly.

Malia wanted her cakes to match the theme of her party, so today’s cupcakes featured teddy grahams hanging out at the beach. They were simple to put together, Malia loved the way they turned out, and they were delicious which is all I can ask from a cupcake!

She had a great time. It was all very low stress. Success for both of us!

A Summer’s Work

Just about as soon as school got out earlier this summer, Daniel and Nathan headed to the temple. They made it a priority, and both went as often as they could with an ever-rotating group of friends. They didn’t limit themselves to once a week but went as often as the fancy hit them. I think Nathan went five times in two weeks once and Daniel went four times last week alone. Matthew went several times as well, although he was not able to get there as often because he doesn’t drive yet and was not always included in his brothers’ trips.

Early in the summer, Nathan found an entire family’s worth of siblings, five brothers and two sisters, that all needed their work done. He printed the names and we set to work with the goal of finishing them in time for a family sealing session my dad had scheduled. The boys worked together to complete the baptisms (Daniel had a female friend do the baptisms for the two sisters), then Daniel did the initiatory and endowment for the brothers and I did the work for the sisters. He did the last endowment yesterday, so we were all ready for this evening’s sealing session.

I love doing sealings because they are the culmination of all the ordinances we do in the temple. It is the one that binds families together. Doing a session with Kevin, Daniel, my parents and my sisters and their spouses was fantastic. It was the first time Daniel has done a sealing session so that made it an even more amazing experience. I know this isn’t the first time I’ve said this, but I love being in the temple with my family. It just reminds me that family is really what it’s all about. And the officiator for our session was so personable and really helped invite the spirit to be with us.

For the names Nathan had discovered, Kevin and I were proxy for the parents and Daniel was proxy for all the sons. One of my sisters was proxy for the daughters. We did all seven names in a row, binding those children to their parents. It made me smile to think about all those siblings rejoicing as they were finally sealed together as a family. I may even have been grinning like an idiot. When we finished the last name, my thoughts suddenly turned, and I had the thought that we were missing someone. I felt a need to check and make sure. The feeling didn’t wane as the session continued and with all the great technology we have, I was able to check as soon as we got back to the car. What I discovered were three more siblings-one brother whose name had been reserved for nearly two years but the work not completed, a sister (the youngest sibling) whose death date means we aren’t able to do her work yet, and the oldest brother for whom no work has been done and whose name is unreserved. Daniel immediately reserved the oldest brother and his wife and printed the cards as soon as we got home. He plans to get the baptisms done tomorrow morning at his next planned temple trip. And the reservation on the other brother will expire in October if his work remains unfinished so I will keep my eye on that to make sure he can join his family as well. As for the youngest sister, we’ll have to let time pass until we can do her ordinances.

To me, having the spirit speak to me about those missing siblings is yet another confirmation that all this is true. These aren’t just random names on paper. They are real people and the work we do for them is vital. The sealer in our session assured us that the acceptance rate of the gospel is far greater on the other side that it is here. Without the veil clouding all we once knew of where we came from, I very much believe that to be true. And I believe this particular family, whose last name is the same as ours, is so happy and so anxious for the remaining siblings to be sealed to them as well.

My boys have been such an amazing example to me all summer. Their desire to be in the temple is inspiring. Their willingness to devote their time and sacrifice other activities be there is humbling. I feel blessed to be their mother.

(Nathan has kept nearly all the name cards he has done baptisms for this summer. He has seventy cards in hand and about thirty more that he doesn’t have the cards for. That is an amazing amount of work done in one summer.)

Eight is Great! (Part I)

Some birthdays are bigger than others. After the big numero uno, which is generally more important to the parents than the child, the first big one in our family is turning five. Five is big because that is when you are old enough to get your own library card, something all my kids looked forward to. The next big one is eight. Malia hit that number today. This one is big not only because she will be getting baptized in a couple of weeks, but because as of today, she can legally ride in the car without her booster seat. Hurrah! It’s about time! Her plan was to throw the booster on the ground ten times, run over it with the car, throw it on the ground ten more times and then throw it out. Yes, it’s kind of overkill, but seriously, she’s beyond excited to be rid of the thing.

She ended up throwing the booster on the ground about twenty times, each time hoping to break the booster, but let’s face it. The things are designed to withstand a car crash. There’s not much an eight-year-old can do to it in terms of breakage. She did manage to break one of the arms and was pleased about that. It has been a busy day full of festivities so there was time to run over the booster with the car, but she has one more that we can destroy another day. She did, however, do a happy dance after she dropped slightly dented booster in the trash.

To move on to actual birthday news, she took a treat to school to share with her class (white fudge Ding Dongs-she had one after a soccer game last month and loved it). There was a pencil and a small treat from the office, her teacher let her choose something out of their classroom treasure box, and she came home with a gift from one of her friends that was invited to her upcoming birthday party but who will be unable to attend. She came home to discover her birthday balloons, one of which was almost as tall as she is! And although it had nothing to do with her birthday, Malia loves activity days so she was happy to have an activity fall on her birthday.

Around here the birthday child always gets to choose what we eat for dinner, so Malia choose spaghetti (no surprise there) with NO MUSHROOMS. We always add mushrooms because 5/6 of us love them, but since it was her birthday, I left them out. She also wrote a note and stuck it to the fridge to make sure I remembered to give her the “You Are Special Today” plate at dinner time.

After dinner, Kevin’s parents arrived to join us for the remainder of the day’s celebration. They had a variety of small presents for Malia, things that Kev’s mom had discovered as they cleaned out her mother’s house after she passed away a few months ago. There were things like some shells from the middle east, some chopsticks purchased in Okinawa, and several tiny wind up mouse toys. As Malia took each item out of the box, my mother-in-law explained about each item. Malia was mesmerized with the whole thing.

Other presents included Lego with a horse and rider theme from Daniel, Nathan, Kevin and I, a series of books about horses, and a horse and rider toy based on an animated Netflix series that Malia binge watches. As I’m sure you can tell, she is all about the horses right now. 😊

We sang and had a simple vanilla cake with whipped cream and fresh berries. There are fancier cakes planned for later this week, but for today’s celebration, we kept it simple.

I’m very grateful Malia is in our family. Having a girl join my crew definitely changed the dynamics of our household. She is funny and witty. She is confident and clever. She is opinionated and stubborn. She is all girl, but she is tough as well. Having three older brothers has helped shape her, even though none of them understand her current fascination with horses. I just tell them it’s a girl thing. 😉

Shhh! I’ve Got a Secret!

Nathan has cousins that he likes and gets along with really well. One of those is Ella, my sister Patti’s youngest daughter. Nathan and Ella have similar interests (piano, singing, theater, etc.) and although Ella is really shy and Nathan is really not, they enjoy each other’s company and feel comfortable enough with each other to let their figurative hair down.  (For a visual representation of their relationship, check out the pictures of the two of them at the baseball game on July 24. 😉)

Over the past several years, Ella has been troubled by bullies at school. It has made for a very unhappy and anxious girl and a very unhappy and anxious mom. As she and my sis discussed high school (Ella is one year younger than Nathan), they knew Ella could not attend the school in whose boundaries they live. Permits were submitted and approved, and plans were made for her to attend a different high school, the same one that my nephew Corbin (Seth’s youngest son who is the same age as Nathan) attends. But a couple of months ago, Ella had a very clear impression that she was headed to the wrong school. She needed to be at our high school, the brand new one that Nathan would be attending. So permits were revoked, new permits were submitted and approved and new plans were made.

Through all of this, Ella opted to keep a strict policy of secrecy. She didn’t want Nathan to know because she wanted to surprise him on the first day of school. Patti and I spent the summer sharing info and coordinating visits to the school in order to keep Ella’s secret. Other family members knew (Kevin and Daniel at my house), but they all managed to keep everything on the down low. Even the choir director at the high school (who grew up down the street from me and is one of Patti’s best friends) knew.

Today was the big reveal, and I kept my phone handy knowing at some point there would be a text barrage. And there was. At a quarter past seven this morning, I got a selfie of my son and my niece on their first day at their brand-new school. Nathan was definitely surprised. And although he thought keeping the secret was “not cool” on our part, I assured him that it most definitely was cool (for the rest of us, at least) and it didn’t take long for him to forget about being upset and just be happy about the whole thing.

The new school does not have over 3500 kids like our high school last year and does have a current enrollment of only 1500. It does not have the wall to wall bodies that made Nathan feel more than a bit anxious on his first day of school last year and it does have enough room in the halls, commons and lunchroom to accommodate all the students. It does not have the two-faced, emotionally manipulative choir teacher Nathan had last year and does have a choir teacher that loves the kids and his job so much that he sent a message to the madrigal group chat one period before their first official class period telling them how ridiculously excited he was for them to arrive. It has none of the bullies that Ella dealt with and one cousin who will stand up for her in any situation. And to get things off to a great start, the principal, who wants to make it a great year for all the kids in their brand new school, bought a balloon for every one of them so they could do a big school spirit balloon release at the end of the day.

Nathan’s largest class is madrigals with a head count of 32. His smallest is AP Calculus with only 10 students. The smaller class sizes are going to be fantastic. Madrigals is going to be fantastic. And having four classes with one of his favorite cousins is going to be more than fantastic. Here’s fingers crossed to a school year that is fantastic all the way around.