Nothing Special, Just Life

Before too long, the lazy days of summer will be upon us. I can't wait. Well I say that, but there is a likely possibility that by mid-day on Monday I'll be wishing some or all of my children were back in school.

With the warmer weather lately, Joshua has preferred flip-flops and shorts to his Wrangler's and boots. Although he spent everyday last week, hot temperatures or not, in his long pants and boots being a cowboy. His gun and hat didn't leave his side for days, and on the rainy day, the back of the couch served him well as a make-shift horse.

Speaking of Joshua, he graduated from pre-school. Which if you remember is a major pet-peeve of both mine and Mike's. Graduations are clearly over-done, and I preferred to view it simply as an "end of year program." Mike was not disappointed in the least that his schedule precluded him from attending. 

Please note Joshua's hair that (still) needs to be cut that stuck out of his "papa bear" hat. (Please further note that I may break down today and take Joshua to the hairdresser's to get his hair cut. Another pet-peeve of Mike's, but it will likely be long enough for a ponytail before Mike gets around to cutting it himself.

Megan and I took Ellie to get some photos done for Ellie's baptism invitations. Ellie plopped down on the grass and began a reading pose with the Book of Mormon prop Megan had brought along. It ended up being my favorite photo. I could have left you to think my children naturally gravitate towards spiritual nourishment and she was genuinely reading and not posing. But after the moans and groans I heard on Sunday when I suggested we put the Book of Mormon CD in while in the car, it is safe to say they do not (yet?) love reading from the Book of Mormon.
(And yes, I have no problem admitting that. More Mormons should.)

Megan and I spent far too much time (and money) at City Creek Shopping Center on Saturday. Megan is at a really fun age to go shopping with, and I love how wise and thoughtful she is about spending her money.  I felt like we literally shopped until we dropped. My tiredness was exasperated further when Megan kept appearing outside my dressing room door saying, "Just try this one on for fun too." I don't try clothes on for fun.

Luke insisted that he was not tired after waking up at 4am for a hike on Monday morning. But when I left him to unload groceries from the suburban while I hurried inside to take care of my rising bread dough, I found him 20 minutes later like this. He was fast asleep.

Drew has a funny fascination with acting like animals. It is not uncommon to see him kneeling up on the counter or table eating his food directly from the bowl with his mouth. And he has been known to sing songs and even pray in animal sounds. He is most often a dog, goat or horse. Typically he does his animal re-enactments in just his underwear, but on occasion he loves to pull out this size18-month horse costume. The too small costume is a far better alternative than his oft-heard declaration, "Animals don't wear unner-wear", which is essentially his request to play completely naked. (I decline that particular request.)

I've tried having the conversation with him that animals really don't drive cars either. But he doesn't seem to care.

And that's us.

A True Mother

There is a speech I frequently periodically give to my children when their behavior and/or attitude gets less than desirable. In short, I remind them of the fact that I gave them life. I remind them that the very fact they are alive and breathing is due to me (and Mike), and so if nothing else, that fact alone grants me respect.

They've each heard it over and over again, and every child of mine could probably give an impressive imitation version of the speech.

This week, I have added a line to my speech when should I ever have to give my speech again to Luke. It's a pretty simple line. In fact, one sentence is all.

"I drove goats to school for you."

Yes. You read that right.

This was me a few days ago.

I must give credit where credit is due. None of it would have been possible without my dear, kind neighbor who loaded the animals into the trailer and of course hooked the trailer to the suburban. All the while my dear husband worked a couple of counties away counting his blessings feeling badly he wasn't the one able to drive goats to school.

As I stood outside the school waiting for Luke and his class to come outside, I was mildly self conscious standing by a trailer with two loud goats inside, while my two pre-schoolers ran up and down the nearby stairs. Instead of ignoring the confused glance of a passer-by father, I simply smiled and declared, "I'm in the running for some Mother-of-the-year award." I'm not sure what his nervous laugh was a result of, the loud neah-ing sounds coming from the goats or my comment.

I'm really not a farm girl. If fact, what am I saying? I AM NOT a farm girl. As my dad likes to say, believe it or not I was once a proper little English school-girl. Yet somewhere along the way I took a drastic "wrong" turn and can now say I have driven goats to school for a 'show and tell'.

Although Hank and Lily stole the show, Luke was a pretty popular guy himself.

This better be a day Luke remembers for the rest of his life. The day his mother drove goats to school!! I don't ever pull trailers, let alone pulling a trailer carrying livestock.

What a mother!
Even if I do say so myself.

Dirty Baseboards and Homemade Forts

It's easier said than done sometimes, but I love the occasional reminder of what really matters. Click HERE to read about my choice to climb into a homemade fort instead of cleaning my house...

Eight IS GREAT

Fortunately the real birthday was much better than the birthday party the day before.

It all began with the traditional "open presents on Mom and Dad's bed" routine. Typically I allow the birthday child to wake everyone up whenever they wake up to begin the celebrations. (Remember I LOVE birthdays and have instilled in my children the "it is so hard to sleep the night before one's birthday" issue.) Ellie's Sunday morning birthday came far too early following an extremely long week for all of us, and I felt mildly guilty about sending her to watch television alone until 7:30am. By then the guilt was preventing me from sleeping any longer and the celebrations began!

(This photo is proof enough how much I have relaxed in many areas of my life. I used to make sure the night before birthdays that my children were wearing cute, appropriate pajamas for pictures on birthday morning. The fact that this year Ellie was wearing snowman/winter pajamas in May made me crinch just slightly as compared to times when I have been known to launder pajamas the day before a birthday to make sure they are wearing cute ones.)

I can't believe I just admitted that!!!

Besides a two-hour church meeting (Stake Conference) Ellie wasn't too excited about, it was a pretty swell day. Ellie loved sewing with her new sewing machine, and told us the time every few minutes with her new "slapwrist" watch. She looked darling in her new outfit, and nobody knew she stuffed tissues in the toes of her new shoes that were a tad too big.

Unfortunately, I'm trying to simplify my life in many areas, and I didn't take as many photos of the day as I typically do. That's okay--it's the mind memories, right? The pizza dinner with grandparents was a pretty good way to celebrate her special day. Ellie was delighted with her "blue 8 cake with pink dots" that she has been awaiting for several weeks now. Not to mention the "#8" candle she has been asking for since February.

Throw in the traditional Pass-the-Parcel game, an exciting game of Musical Chairs and plenty of time to sit around playing, talking, and of course sewing. It was a pretty great day. Including a photo with Grandpa Steve, whose birthday she shares.

At 7:45pm, we hooped and hollered as Ellie's official birth-time was recognized and she innocently looked up at me from her bed and very seriously asked, "Did all my body switch to 'eights' now?" It was humorous and endearing all mixed to one.


Ellie is EIGHT!

Not My Best

Ellie's EIGHTH birthday fell on a Sunday this year, and after much deliberation about whether or not to have a "friend party" or not, Ellie opted to have one! The Saturday afternoon before her official birthday was declared the day of choice.

I wish I could tell you that the best memories of the party are of the t-shirts we let each little girl design and color, or the cute bracelets they each made. Or even the present opening, or the games. Except those memories have already faded into the recesses of "typical childhood birthday party" and instead we are left with the memories of...

**Mike, Joshua and Luke returning home 15 minutes into the party, dirty and muddy and in desperate need of clean clothes. I couldn't bear to think of them walking upstairs dusting their path with mud and instead insisted on them each stripping down in the garage and running quickly upstairs wearing just their underwear. My job was to distract the little party-goers from threatening any of the boys' dignity. In my defense, there were several little girls at the party, and so I really had no idea that one of the girls was standing there staring at her friend's dad, big brother and little brother as they streaked through the house. (On the bright side, at least their underwear wasn't muddy and so I hadn't requested that be removed too.)

**Mike was very tired from his early morning, (working in aforementioned mud) and previous long work week that he was pretty sluggish when I politely asked him to please send the girls outside for the next activity. Somehow Mike didn't get them outside fast enough, and Ellie got distracted on her way outside with the china platter of hot pink cupcakes and attempted to carry it amidst 11 giggly, moving around 7-8 year olds. I got frustrated and nervous she was carrying my favorite platter full of cupcakes and as she attempted to set it down on the table to calm her mother's nerves, she bumped it against the edge of the table and cupcakes spilled everywhere. On the bright side, when I exclaimed an "Oh my h@##!" and began to not so kindly ask Ellie what in the world she was thinking, the girls all got outside in a much more timely manner than Mike was originally getting them out there.

On the not-so-bright side, I felt like a pretty crummy mother for hours after the party as I replayed the scene over and over in my mind. What really would it have mattered even if the white china platter had smashed and 12 cupcakes were ruined completely? Ellie says she has forgiven me, but I am still fully prepared for this to be one of those memories she will never quite erase from her memory.

** The neighbor children around here know Mike is kidding when he begs them for anything they are eating. On the other hand, most of the little girls at Ellie's party don't know Mike well at all. So when Mike sat in his chair outside asking for particular pieces of candy from their pinata loot bag, the girls were timidly handing pieces over to him. I quickly put a stop to it after I saw a little girl's face as she was handing over the begged for candy. I demanded Mike return each piece of candy and tried to explain to the not-so-smiley girls that Mike was playfully teasing them.

It really wasn't one of the better birthday parties I've hosted. And I've hosted a lot!

They say "It is great to be eight" but in my defense, Ellie's birthday party was held the day before her birthday, so she was still seven. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

Better Late than Never

It's a few days late, but for my own sake, I don't want to forget Mother's Day 2012.

Now, don't start getting worried that I'm going to regale you with tales of Mother's Day at our house that will leave you feeling as though your special day was a total flop. I won't.

I have no tales of breakfast-in-bed, perfectly behaved children or my time spent being pampered. Instead, I'll tell you about the hand-written note that said, "I'm glad you were invented" and the game of hot potato we all played while sitting under the trampoline, and the nap that Mike and I took on the grass in the shade of the shed. (My nap lasted about 10 minutes until I seemed to be the one a child urgently needed, which was actually just fine. I'm not a fan of naps, and that was probably the first one I've taken in a year.)

I'll skip the part about being completely confused whether it was Mother's Day or Father's Day when Mike "completely vanished" and wasn't to be found anywhere. I finally told a child to look for him in Drew's bedroom. A place nobody had thought to look for him previously because they know it is a strict rule not to go into the bedroom during Drew's naptime. Mike had snuck in there to finish up the nap that didn't last as long as he had hoped outside in the shade of the shed. (Not sure if Mike's first nap was interrupted because of the shade turning to full sun, or the wife whining that she had been summoned to wipe a bum and not him.)

I'll tell you about the interview Mike video-ed of Joshua and me, and Joshua responding to Mike's question of how much I weigh with, "36 inches." I'll tell you about my children gathered around me trying to get everyone to smile for a photo.

I won't tell you about the mini-tantrum I had when I realized one of the best photos of us all actually smiling nicely and looking at the camera had Megan doing 'bunny ears' to me. It was deleted during part of the tantrum. Even though now, several days later I probably could (almost) laugh about it.

I can't tell you of serious, heartfelt expressions of love as we spent plenty of hours together all Sunday afternoon. Although I will tell you about the unrestrained laughter when Luke made a completely innocent (but hilarious to Mike and me) comment about the word "ass" found in the Book of Mormon scripture verse we were reading.

I have no tales of flower bouquets, pedicures or massages. But I will tell you about the painted handprint butterfly print Drew made for me in his nursery class at church. (Bless those nursery leaders! It is one of my all-time favorite Mother's Day gifts.) I'll tell you about the homemade heartfelt letters I received from everyone except Drew. I'll tell you about the Milky Way candy bar and box of Hot Tamales that were lovingly picked out for me. (I'll skip the part about Mike opening the Hot Tamales and eating most of the box himself.)

It was one of my absolute favorite Mother's Days ever.

It was perfect in a completely imperfect way.

Important People

On Sunday, tears streamed down my face during the opening song in our Sacrament Meeting at church. It wasn't because we singing the song I typically hate that we sing every Mother's Day (Love at Home). It was because my thirteen year old daughter was accompanying the congregation on the organ. My heart was full with joy and pride watching Megan do something I would probably never have the guts (or talent) to do.

Over the weekend, I was told to be sure and watch the P&G Olympic tribute to mothers. I didn't get around to it until today. As I watched, I couldn't help but think of Megan playing the organ on Sunday at church. I thought of the years leading up to it--rides to and from music lessons, nagging gentle reminders to practice, check after check written out to music teachers and so on.

Very few of our children will become Olympians. Few of our children will become church organists. But this tribute to mothers shows all the work that goes behind the scenes to make our children great. Although this video shows children participating in athletic events, it would be no different if we were seeing a video of a child helping out a friend that is sad, or a child finally passing a math test at school, or a child holding a door for a stranger, or a child who can finally tie their own shoe. All events that very often, all of us as mothers have helped happen.

Just this morning I came across this sentence in an essay by Chrysula Winegar, a champion for mothers worldwide.  "I remember that being a mother is the most powerful role in society - a fact that society works very hard at concealing from us."

I've said enough. Watch the video and give yourself a pat on the back.
Mother's Day or not.
We mothers are pretty powerful and important people.
YOURSELF included.