April

We've just been living regular life these days. That basically means playing all day, preschool 3 days a week, library once a week, errand day once a week. We are seeing Jake only in the mornings and sometimes for dinner. He's very busy with his campaign putting out signs, meeting people, attending meetings, etc. We just continue to hope and pray that he wins his Primary in about 5 weeks. 

My greatest struggle these days is Miss Leah. That girl has a strong will if I ever knew one. She can really push our buttons at times and we just feel at a loss with what to do with her. Screaming back at her, though the easiest thing to do, doesn't work. We've tried it plenty of times; usually in the middle of the night for her to get back in bed and go to sleep. I really, really, really try to remember to be patient with her. I was thinking about it tonight and wondering why this is so hard. Then the thought came to me that parenthood is an eternal principle; why should I be able to master it in a few short years? Not that I'm giving up and counting on figuring it all out in the eternities. I just think I need to take it one day at a time; one battle at a time. And remember that this child has a purpose in life that I need to help her realize. And the times when I feel like that purpose is to drive me insane, I need to remember to take a deep breath, speak kindly, and try to really react as Heavenly Father would want me to do. I've learned that if she's tired, hungry, or bored her behavior can become questionable. These things should be pretty easy to avoid if I am prepared and live life by a schedule. She also likes to say the same thing at the same time during some of our routines. Makes me crazy, but I think it's just something I need to learn to live with. The best example is putting on chapstick before bed each night. For a couple weeks each night she would say, "What does this taste like?" Then I would tell her, "strawberry lemonade." Then the next couple of weeks she would say, "I know what this tastes like-strawberry lemonade." I've told her over and over she doesn't need to tell me these things. So now the last week and a half has been, "I'm not going to tell you what this tastes like." To anyone reading this, it probably seems funny. And maybe it is. And I know it's just a silly little thing that a 3 year-old girl does. But after a long day with this little goose, it's the last thing I want to hear because it's the epitome of me telling her not to do something and she does it anyways. Like drinking the bathwater. Like eating the toothpaste. Like not making it to the bathroom in time even though I remind her to go. Like bothering Adam. Like bothering Adam. Like bothering Adam. I do certainly love this little girl-she's my baby Leah. And at least for now my one and only daughter. I hope that I can learn to be more patient, spend more time with her, and love her even more so that my life can be calmer and hers can be happier.

This may sound like my life is just a never-ending battle with my heathen daughter and two perfect sons. This, of course, is far from the truth. The boys certainly contribute to the craziness that our life usually is. But my kids are mine and they are wonderful, beautiful, and perfect and they teach me so much. Here's a few pictures of life lately....

If the weather allows, we are outside. No questions asked. Adam has discovered he loves digging in the dirt. Thankfully, he's not putting it in his mouth any more. Just the rocks. Lovely. 

 And with all that time outside comes bath time. Almost every night; sometimes twice a day. (And I love that Adam is in almost the same position in these two pictures!)

 Yard sale season has finally arrived. This was my steal at an unplanned stop last week on the way home from preschool. All for Leah...two pairs Children's Place jeans, one pair Reef flip flops (or fip fops as she calls them), Carter's sandals, and Carter's tennis shoes (both of which may have never been worn) for a grand total of $5. Yay! :)

 And Adam on an average day....

 Isaac loves his computer time. He asks almost every day for a new game...which means a new website. I'm really running out of ideas here.

 Leah "helping" make cookies. Actually, I had just finished making them and ran upstairs to change Adam when I heard the chair sliding across the kitchen floor. I knew exactly what was happening and was not surprised when I came down and found this:

Life as we know it...

I just realized this post was never posted...so one year later here it is  :)

A quick recap of life lately...

Isaac got tubes put in his ears yesterday morning. He did great-didn't cry at all when they took him back and wasn't too groggy when he was done. They said the anesthesia (which he was under for a whopping 2 minutes!) would make him cranky-it didn't. He laid around when we got home for about a half hour and then was running around like always. Hopefully the improvement in his hearing will also help his speech progress.

As of late last night we now have carpet in our house (hooray-no more dust!). We close two weeks from today. Can't wait.

We spent a night at a water-park hotel here in Des Moines with Jake's family for Spring Break. The kids and I braved the St. Patrick's Day parade with the over 374,289,167,263 people who were there. The kids had fun, though they were disappointed to only walk away with a piece of candy and a necklace each.

Almost two months ago we had Leah's birthday-a purple penguin party.

And because baby pictures are always a necessity, here's our little Adam who is currently in the 75% for his weight and almost into 6 month clothes at less than 3 months of age. Whose baby is this?!?! He's a darling little guy and we love him and all his smileyness to pieces!

March and April so far...

Not sure why, but all my Easter pictures posted here instead of at the bottom of my post. Anyways, we dyed eggs the Friday before Easter-Jake blew the insides out of an egg and dyed an empty shell. I guess to impress the kids. We were just grossed out by the sight of the egg shooting out of a tiny hole in the shell.

 This series of Leah just cracks me up. That's just Leah.

 The day before Easter we had dinner an an egg hunt at Aunt Cindy's for the kids. It was super windy, but that was just fine because we always fly kites, too.

March started like normal...just hanging out at home most days. Here's a few pictures the kids took of each other....

 For Spring Break, Jake's parents took us all to the waterpark hotel in Des Moines for a night and then we visited the zoo since the weather was BEAUTIFUL! Isaac and Leah could have swam forever. It took Adam a little while to get used to the water-he loved sitting in the shower in our room (this hotel has very few rooms with bathtubs...strange, I think so!).

 April showers bring...grass! Our grass is really finally starting to grow. Hooray. Our kids might actually get to play in our yard this summer instead of just the neighbors!

 The kids just playing away...Isaac and Leah rocking it out to some music one day.

 Leah had a Daddy-Daughter date one night to Teddy Bear Connection (just like Build-A-Bear) and she came home with a unicorn in silky heart pajamas. Not what I was expecting her to choose, but she loves it. Once they were done, Jake took her and Adam home and Isaac and I went on our date to see the dinosaurs-just a weekend thing at the state fairgrounds. When we walked in he was freaked out-he probably would have ran out the door had I given him the option. But after a little while he got used to the noise, dark, and movement of the whole thing and had a great time.

With April comes General Conference. I used to always make cinnamon rolls in college for it, but got out of the habit the last several years. Found this recipe on Pinterest and it was a hit. Yummy! The kids played a little on the deck and had lots of snacks and activities to keep them busy while we watched and listened to our church leaders. 

This Spring has had some very warm days-here the kids are in swimsuits eating popsicles-in the beginning of April!

And the pictures now from the Easter Sunday....

 Gotta love the bunny teeth suckers. :)

 Adam was sitting in his seat at the table eating a push-pop. I couldn't find it when I got him down. Then he walked away and there it was!  LOL.

 After church we went to Jake's parents and then mine for more Easter celebrations. I made a dress for Leah and a skirt for me and of course Jake and boys matched us, but the day was so crazy and Jake ended up with a horrible headache that we never got a chance to take pictures. Guess we'll have to wear it all again soon and take pictures then!

 

Our next adventure for April was a trip to Kansas City. The main reason was to attend the open house at the temple just built down there. But with so much to do there, we figured we'd squeeze in a few more stops. We went first to the SeaLife Aquarium that just opened. It was awesome and the kids had a great time-I was even pleased to help them each choose a $3 item from the gift shop. (Not an easy task when most things are WAY overpriced). There is a LegoLand connected to it, but it doesn't open until May. We'll definitely have to go back down to see that place. 

 Here's Adam-just a little hard to see since he's still in the stroller. :)

The Aquarium is in CrownCenter, which is just a big shopping and eating place downtown. The water in the fountain outside was dyed bright blue for some reason.

 For dinner, we ate at Fritz's Railroad Restaurant. The food was eh, but the experience was pretty neat, especially for the kids, since our food was delivered by a train.

 After eating, we went up to the Crayola store-I could have spent some serious money there. Lots of fun things! Saturday morning we went through the temple. It was beautiful! The kids did really well and thought it was awesome to actually get to go inside. It was a little breezy that day and we learned the sitting near a spraying geyser of a fountain is not the best place to take a picture. This was the last attempt; made right as a mighty gush of wind came in from behind us. The kids and I got a little wet and the hundreds of people around who may have been watching got a good laugh, I'm sure. But a little water never hurt anyone!

 After a quick clothes-changing session at the hotel and some lunch, we headed back downtown to the Science Center, where we got in free with our pass we have here. Yay! It was awesome-SO much to do. Certainly bigger and better than ours here in Des Moines. It's located in Union Station, which still functions as a train station, just isn't used quite as much as in the old days.

Jake tried to help Leah land a rocket; she soon lost interest and Jake became determined to do it without crashing. He failed. Both attempts. :)

 We didn't want to spend too much time at the Science Center because we knew some severe storms were in the forecast for the whole trip home. Thankfully, we didn't run into any bad weather on the drive, not even rain. However, after 15 minutes after we got home it started raining like crazy. So much and so fast that our e-gress window well filled with water, broke the window in, and flooded our basement with a couple inches of water. Oh, and the power went out at the same moment the window broke. Guess how many flashlights we found with working batteries? One; a tiny one from the dollar store. And the crank one from our 72-hour kit. Ahh..it was a nightmare. Nothing motivates preparation like the crisis you were hoping to be prepared for. Thankfully, we were able to get a generator to run our sump pump. Jake and his Dad did what they could in the dark and then called it a night. We all stayed at Jake's parents that night. Jake's mom took the kids to church for me Sunday and Jake, his dad, Travis and Bri (and Arabella!), and I worked all day Sunday to empty the basement and start the clean-up. Not what I wanted to spend my Sabbath doing, but that's the way it is sometimes I guess. We were able to replace the window Monday and everything is pretty much back to normal now. I was so glad we had most of our stuff in Rubbermaid bins; those just had to wiped off and taken back down. All our extra bedding was in cardboard moving boxes still and had to be washed. I think I did 10 loads of laundry on Monday. :( We are just grateful we didn't lose anything of real value; all our sentimentally important stuff was still dry or was already upstairs. And what a blessing to have our family here to help-thanks, everyone! And as nice as it would be to have a finished basement, it's really a lot better to have it unfinished when it floods. We are now in the process of getting bids for some grading work or drain tile to be done on the yard to prevent this from happening again. Just another bump in the road of life, right?

Jake and I went to the kindergarten parent meeting this past Tuesday. Exciting and sad to have our first baby off to school in a few months. He's really excited; I, of course, worry about his speech holding him back academically and socially, but he really does just fine at preschool and I know he'll be caught up soon. He goes for kindergarten screening in a couple weeks. It should be interesting to see how he does, though I know he'll love it and want to go back right away.