Today was full of fun!

Started the day with the discovery that I lost 2 pounds; I decided yesterday to make a goal of losing 35 pounds in 35 weeks, so this was very heartening :D

Decided to get the day started right, with chores getting done quickly instead of wandering around wondering what to do next and telling the kids I couldn't play with them b/c I was busy. Made eggs with bell peppers, onions, and mushrooms, and wrapped them in whole-wheat tortillas with cheese and (organic) ketchup. Oh heaven! And when we were done eating breakfast, it was only 8 o'clock! So we played duck-duck-goose, and had a blast :D
While eggs were cooking, Jack was being mischievous, so I gave him the chore of unloading the dishwasher. I've previously refrained from giving him that chore b/c he would have to stand on a stool to put up dishes and I thought that was too hard. He did fabulously, with minimal complaining :D

The things I'm focusing on right now for Jack are training him to do chores, to not give up, to think creatively, and to learn the stories of the scriptures.
-I'm learning to slow down and help him learn how to help me do all my chores, and he and I are both loving it; we get more time together and he feels helpful and important and loved, and he learns, and I love having his company.
-When he is having a hard time doing something, I encourage him to keep trying. I might offer him advice, but I don't rush in and do it for him; this is a change from before, when I would do things for him to avoid a screaming fit. He's not a baby anymore, thankfully, and he's doing pretty well with this. I love to see his excitement when he conquers a difficult task!
-When he asks me a question that I think should be obvious, I try not to berate him for asking a dumb question, give him the answer, or ignore him (things that I have been doing). I try to ask him questions that will lead him to the answer, or ask him to consider his question and tell me the answer. Also, when we watch a story (from the Book of Mormon Stories DVD) and act it out, if he doesn't know what comes next, I don't tell him, I make him go back to the iPad and watch it again so he can remember what happens. I do this b/c he has actually regressed in his story-telling skills; when he was 2 he could rehearse those stories with astonishing accuracy, but now he rarely remembers the beginning or end. I've been jogging his memory by reminding him of what he forgot, but I've been alarmed at how little he's been remembering of the stories he's been watching. My thought was that he was getting so used to me filling in for him that he wasn't trying anymore, so I'm not filling in for him anymore and we'll see what happens.
-And that's how we're learning the stories of the scriptures. Currently only the Book of Mormon Stories DVD is on the iPad, but someday we'll have the Stories from the Old Testament, New Testament, and Doctrine and Covenants too. He'll probably prefer the Book of Mormon Stories for a while, just b/c he prefers familiarity, but we'll work on that. We watch one every night before bed and he has to rehearse it back to us so we know he got it, and then he has the option of watching more before he falls asleep. We also watch them together as an activity during the day, and then act them out; Jack has discovered the joy of acting, and it's so much fun to watch him try so hard to remember his part!

Sent Tim off to work on time. He is so wonderful and he loves spending time with us, so he's really bad about hanging around here and not showing up to work until 10 or 11 or 12..... but then he has to stay late to make up that lost time, and I would MUCH MUCH MUCH rather have him home in the evenings than in the mornings, so I kick him out by 9 :D

Then Jack asked if we could play chase, and I said we could. I chased him, he chased me, I chased him, he chased me, and Lily followed us and giggled; then she fussed and I picked her up and she didn't smile, so I asked her if she was ready for her nap and she nodded. Silly girl takes her nap between 9:30 and 10am!

After I got her asleep, I read a chapter in The Magician's Nephew (the real first book in the Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis) to Jack. This was an idea of mine to copy my friend Malina who reads long chapter books to her homeschooled boys while her toddler naps; I wasn't sure Jack was old enough but I decided it would be fun to try. At first I was much more excited than Jack was, but I think he's warming up to it, b/c later in the day he asked if we could read more of it. yay!

Then I attempted to pay bills. We expected to get Tim's sign-on bonus with this paycheck, so I was rather dismayed when I checked our account online and discovered that it wasn't there. I ended up just playing on facebook and wasting time...

But I did get supper started, beans and rice :D

After Lily woke, we ate lunch. We had apples, and I had a soynut-butter and jelly sandwich that I cut a piece of and shared with Lily. She LOVES it when I give her peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, so I was really excited to see that she enjoyed the soynut-butter as much as peanut butter. She's too young to have peanuts yet; when we gave Jack peanuts too early he developed a peanut sensitivity. Thankfully it went away after taking out the peanuts from his diet, but I'd rather not make that same mistake again with Lily!

Then we headed over to our old apartment to check the mail and look at the walls that our landlady said looked so bad they'd cost $350 to patch and re-paint. Decided to just do it myself, and warned her that we won't be able to pay rent this month til next paycheck. I'm really grateful that she was so nice about that, she said I'd have to talk to the bookkeeper but she's pretty sure there will be no problem. Visited one of my neighbors there, the one with the trampoline in her backyard, and actually got on it with Jack and Lily and jumped and jumped and jumped and had a great time! Went to the dentist to get more MI paste, the stuff I put on their teeth that both hardens their enamel and discourages bacterial growth. Then went to the paint store to get the paint and nail-hole-filler; poor Lily was NOT happy about getting in and out of the car so many times, but we had to go to 3 different stores to find everything.

Came home and Lily asked to nurse, and then fell asleep doing so. So Jack asked if we could read more of our book. Not iPad, not food, but The Magician's Nephew was his first request. Score! We read THREE WHOLE CHAPTERS before my mouth was sore and I had to quit, and Jack wanted more! So I reminded him that he has a marble track he can play with when Lily's asleep, and he happily did so while I finished supper. Tim came home and Lily woke up grumpy, but he held her and she warmed up. She loves her Daddy! I finally finished de-boning the Thanksgiving turkey while supper simmered, and felt so accomplished!

Ate supper. It was quite yummy: beans and rice, a staple in our home, but with celery and cajun seasoning this time. Jack ate his, Lily enjoyed hers, and Tim always loves my food, so I was happy :D And Tim made a peanut-butter and banana smoothie to drink with our meal; I didn't get much of mine b/c both of my kids wanted it, but I guess it's more important to feed my kids healthy food than to horde it for myself. After dinner, kids played happily while I made hot chocolate by melting dark chocolate in milk and adding sugar; Jack was excited but ended up not liking it b/c it was too rich! I had just a teeny bit, Tim diluted his with cold milk, and Lily said it was weird to drink something that was warm. So Jack had a mint chocolate chip milkshake instead, and Lily fished all the chocolate chips out of his cup; they then ran all over the house shrieking and squealing and playing together while I put away some clean dishes.

And then suddenly they were both tired! I got Lily all ready for bed and nursed her to sleep while Jack watched Book of Mormon Stories, then when she was down I discovered Jack was asleep as well. Poor kid, he missed his bedtime story (we talk about all the good things we did and what our favorites were).

And now it's my turn to go to bed! Tim is working on some pretty piece of work for an upcoming conference. If I ask him to tell me about it in detail, I'll conk right out...

Photos!

Jack on her Grandpa's lap (Tim's dad, Brian). She always stares really hard at him when we visit; our theory is that since Tim looks a lot like his dad, she just can't get enough of the face her dad's is patterned after :D

(This really isn't the best picture of him, he really is a handsome fellow, but it's a good one of Lily!)

The Lily Flower and Jack the Ninja Turtle at the Halloween Party in Dallas. Lily loved her costume and asked to wear it over and over again afterwards; Jack borrowed this costume from Malina b/c the one I bought for him wasn't what he wanted :P

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving at home :D We had a blast! We had turkey, green bean casserole (from scratch with no cream-of-whatever soup!), and mashed potatoes/sweet potatoes (all homemade), store-bought rolls and pie, and homemade cookies. We played games together and lazed about the house all day. In short, we had a glorious holiday "staycation"!

We happen to enjoy Harry Potter :D We owned movies 1-5 (the first 3 were actually gifted to us..), so we started Monday watching the first movie after FHE, then Tuesday watched the second, Wednesday the third, Thanksgiving day the fourth and fifth, Black Friday we actually went to the store to buy the sixth b/c it wasn't available to rent at redbox or iTunes (and we actually got a decent deal on it thanks to Target's Black Friday sales). Then, Tim and I actually got to go out on a date to go see the seventh, on Friday night! A sweet friend from our former ward in Palo Alto came and watched our kids, and we redeemed codes that were on some cereal boxes to get free movie tickets, and away we went! We enjoyed the time together and the movie, and our friend and her 1-year-old boy had fun with our kids, and our kids had fun with her and her son. Win-win-win!

Church today was great. I'm getting in a habit of making Jack listen to the talks during sacrament meeting; I cuddle him close and ask him to listen with me, and we talk about what the talks are about. (Of course they're usually over his head, so I get to explain them to him, and of course while I'm explaining I can't hear what's being said, so we just take that as a discussion launcher and head off on our own!) Jack is getting pretty good at it; I worry I'm making his ears soft and dumb b/c I'm always filling in for him when he doesn't know what they're talking about, but he is getting in the habit of being reverent in church and not hating it (I hope!).
Another habit we're getting into is taking the kiddos for a run after sacrament meeting. We go down the hall to the water fountains and bathrooms, then go out the nearest door and run around the building to the door near the Primary room. Since I'm not in Primary with him, I don't know for sure that it helps, but he loves it and I do too. And I've been peeking in on him and every time I've been quite pleased with what I've seen: not only reverence and obedience, but active listening and participation! Today I peeked in when they had a big doll house at the front and were taking suggestions from the kids for what to put in the house. Jack said "a mommy and a sister" but they already had that, so he quickly said "A Grandma and an Aunt Lauren!" And he told me later that he would have said "Toys, too!" but they moved on to the next kid too quickly! Then later in his class I listened without peeking in, and I heard happiness. Yay Jack!

Sweet Lily needed me during Nursery today, and it was funny b/c I didn't know what to do! When Jack was in Nursery, I was a Primary teacher, so it was always Tim who took care of him. AND Lily is such an independent child, I never dreamed she'd have any problems with Nursery! But after snack time, I was peeking in seeing how she was doing, and I saw them cleaning up the snacks and putting them away. Lily picked up the box of goldfish crackers and handed them to the teacher and nodded, which means "Yes I want this!" But the poor teacher didn't know that, and took the box and said "Thank you!" and put it away. Lily didn't melt down right then, so I went on to class, but they brought her to me soon after that and said she'd started crying right after snack, so she must have started right after I walked away. I held her and she pointed the way to those goldfish crackers; I gave her a couple of handfuls of them and she was quite happy. She anxiously pointed in the exact opposite direction from her Nursery room as we walked back past it to go to my class; I think it was b/c she heard them singing her least-favorite song (where each kid gets spotlighted and their clothing sung about). I took her to Relief Society with me and she sat stock-still and quiet in my lap for all of one minute, then she pointed at the door and fussed. I asked her if she was ready to go back to Nursery and she nodded, so I took her in and sat with her for the rest of singing time. (She really doesn't like singing time, I wonder if I should try to do something about that or just let it play out? Should I speak to the teachers with some suggestions for improving it, or maybe start having some singing time at home?) She was happy in my lap, and then she hopped down and was fine without me again but by then it was time to leave!

Lily is willing to try things, like I just wrote about when she sat in my lap in Relief Society, and also when she tried to go potty in the bathroom at church. She had a poopy diaper, and I knew she had more to go, so I tried to hold her backwards over the potty just like I used to when she was tiny and almost all her waste went in the potty. She tried it, then shook her head. I asked her if she'd like to sit on it normally, and she nodded, and she actually supported herself pretty well on that giant (for her) potty seat, but then she shook her head again. (I LOVE that she's saying "yes" and "no" this way!)

We got a dishwasher! Our wonderful landlords put it in yesterday! Woohoo!

Photos!

While we were moving in and unpacking, Lily found her wrap and carried it to Tim and demanded to be put in it! They were very happy I was nearby to show him how to put it on; he spent the next half hour singing and dancing about how much his Lily loves him and how much he loves his Lily. Did ever a daughter love her Daddy as much as this one does?

Also while unpacking and moving in, Lily got cold. This blanket is technically Jack's, but he's good at sharing, and Lily loves it at least as much as he does :D I love this pic b/c I have one of Jack wrapped up just like this when he was little, too (but of course I can't find it at the mo'...).

Have I mentioned my kids love playing in the bathtub?

Our Thanksgiving feast needed 2 tables; our kiddos were excited to eat it!

Jack loves putting sprinkles on cookies; this one was also his idea, to make one big cookie so he could put lots of sprinkles on it! (He also took this picture of the giant pretty cookie!)

We moved! After we spent time in Texas...

So, we went to Texas and had a blast. My kids played with my friend and her kids, and her baby came and he was perfect :D We got to visit my in-laws, and Tim even got to come after he signed a new contract to work for Palm. (He quit his old job two days after kids and I left, then spent 2 weeks in job interviews before settling on Palm. The offered the best pay and the fewest hours, and an exciting job with a great work environment. 2 weeks in, he's loving it!) We got to visit friends and family and spend lots of time with SHARE, the homeschooling group there that is water to my parched soul.

We came home October 30th because Tim needed to get started at his new job and my friend was ready to take over her house and home again :D Tim's new job in Sunnyvale was a half-hour commute from our apartment in downtown Palo Alto, so we started house-hunting close to his work. I decided pretty quickly that I needed a house with a yard, so I declared I didn't care how much I spent on rent and just started looking at houses. Luckily, Tim insisted on trying to keep our rent payment low, and we found the PERFECT house. It's 2.8 miles from his work and it has 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 2-car attached garage, and a fenced backyard. I've never loved a house as much as I love this one; I don't hate California anymore, though I do still miss my friends and family.

We moved lickety-split. We have only 2 boxes left to unpack; we have a few boxes of books and such that will be unpacked once we have more shelving on which to unpack them to, but I don't count those! Problem with moving, though, is that the lease wasn't up on our apartment yet. So we're still responsible for the rent there. So even though Tim's making more than he's ever made before, we are still broke! The manager of our old apartment is advertising it and hopefully it will get rented soon; we are in talks with a realtor to sell our condo, too. That will be so great when that's all done!

My kiddos are growing up so fast. Yesterday I realized how much Jack loves to act out the one story we've ever acted out (the story of Samuel the Lamanite calling the Nephites to repentance). I was getting tired of doing the same thing over and over, so I showed Jack that we can do other stories, too. That opened up the floodgates! He watches Book of Mormon stories, begs me to watch them with him so I'll know what to do, then we each take a part and start acting. It's so much fun to watch him learn the stories with such enthusiasm!

Lily is so much like her brother. I was expecting her to be so different, and she is in some ways, but she is so much like him. Jack was a late talker, but I wasn't worried. Boys talk later than girls, and Tim was a late talker, so I just knew it would work out, and it did. He started talking at 20 months and just exploded with words, and had a full 2-year-old vocabulary in just 2 months. But Lily being a girl and being so different from Jack as a baby, I was expecting her to talk sooner, but she's 18 months now and still doesn't talk. I've decided not to worry b/c she DOES communicate, with whispers, gestures, and non-word vocalizations. She points to what she wants, she nods her head for "yes" and shakes it for "no" (and she's even started saying "no"), she pats her diaper when she needs a change. She's learning to catch her food in her hands when she spits it out, she's using a spoon and a cup pretty well, and she puts her shoes on by herself. She helps clean up messes, both by wiping up spills and picking up toys. This morning she even showed patience by waiting for me to get dressed before I nursed her :D She's decided that baths are fun again b/c she loves to play with the water, and this is another reason I love my new house: the bathroom with a bathtub is off of the kitchen, so the kids can play in the tub and I can cook/clean while they play and I can still keep an eye on them to make sure Lily doesn't drown! (When the water gets deep, she loses her balance and falls underwater. That's what happened months ago and she decided to be terrified of baths from then on, until now.)

Yesterday, Jack helped me cook broccoli casserole for supper. We had so much fun! He dumped the broccoli into the boiling water, poured the milk for the sauce, stirred up the sauce and poured it in, and helped me pick the seasonings to use. And then, when the casserole was done, HE ATE IT. Yes, Jack ate BROCCOLI casserole. With no fuss. Hallelujah! Then he helped me make cookies by dumping in ingredients and helping to stir; then he rolled balls of cookie dough in a plateful of sprinkles to make beautifully colorful cookies :D Then we had Family Home Evening and finished the night by watching the first Harry Potter movie and eating cookies; Lily spent about an hour shrieking and jumping on us, and Jack conked out with his head in my lap. Good times :D

So Thanksgiving is coming up and we don't have money for plane tickets :( We decided we'd drive to Utah to visit Tim's family up there, but there are mountains between here and there that are covered in snow. Tim has to work the day before Thanksgiving, so if we went we'd be driving overnight, and I just don't quite feel safe about driving overnight through snow-covered mountains. So it looks like we'll be celebrating our first ever Thanksgiving at home. We worked hard to get our unpacking done quickly and I feel at home here, so I'm really quite excited about it! I'm making a menu and trying to keep it short and simple so I can spend more time playing with my family; I'm planning on doing the grocery shopping today so I can possibly do some cooking tomorrow. And we might even go take the kids to the mountains Friday or Saturday so we can play in the snow!

Pictures!

Packing to go to Texas!

Lily went to Malina and didn't let go of her for about 15 minutes! I wonder if Lily remembered Malina? She did the same thing with her Grandma (Tim's mom) and with Vickie; Vickie and Malina were there when she was born and we spent lots of time together while we lived in Texas.

Lily and her Nanna, my mom :D

All the grandkids together! (And Jessica, Tim's older sister and mother of the two little girls in front of her.) This is marginally the best picture of the 60-something I snapped. Trying to take a photo of 4 little ones is fun!