Is It Naptime Yet

So I was sick like all last week. Well my throat was swollen and I started sounding funny Thursday and today, Monday or 5 days later, I’m finally starting to sound like myself.
At one point I thought I might get laryngitis, but the girls weren’t so lucky as to have a mom without a voice.

I’m so happy to start sounding normal. I hate having a sick voice, though nothing else was wrong with me, any stranger wanted to stay five feet away from me, and I’m sure some friends too.

So I’m hoping to begin cutting Eden’s costume today. I’ll be going to the store to get the rest of the materials later tonight before FHE.

I’m going to have Naia 3 days a week this month again, so I’m not sure what I will and will not get done.

I’m hoping my sister Andrea has her baby soon, though it may be a little bit still.
I’m so excited for her.

I’ve heard that there’s been a lot of funk feelings going around.
I sympathize with you all, in different ways though. I hope we’re all able to get over them.

For me making the girls costumes is exciting to me. I really enjoy making things and having the girls look cute is so fun. I do like praise after all. 😉
I am bummed that our trunk or treat is the night of Halloween. The other ward that we combine with for this party decided to do it the night of Halloween, and the youth are in charge of games and carnival type booths. Yeah, what youth wants to be at a ward party rather than trick or treating. Honestly as a parent I would let my 12-17 year old decide where they wanted to be since they’re old enough to take care of themselves.
Also our block and neighborhood is always so quiet that I feel like it’s my duty as one of the few people who participate in Halloween to be home and give out candy. Literally we had five house on our little block out of 20-30 homes be home and give out candy last year, which included our home. I also don’t like having to pick between a church function and my community.
So I may stop by the trunk or treat, but that’s it. Which makes me sad because I like the fact that the girls wear their costumes twice when we have the trunk or treat on a different night than Halloween. I may crash my parents or sister’s trunk or treat if they have theirs on a different night.
I guess if we do dress up for Lilah’s class they get to wear them that day also, but I just don’t like ward activities on Holidays even if it is just Halloween and the trunk or treat is suppose to help replace the dangerous going out and trick or treating. I think to do it on the holiday secludes you from your community and how many wanderers off the street are we going to get the night of Halloween. “Hey there’s a lot of cars giving our candy lets go.”
Totally a bad idea.
Anyways, I’m off to start cutting fabric. The girls are going to be so cute.

Here they are racing a little.

On Wednesday we took an adventure with Julie, Naia, and her step-son Reagan.
We went to the beautiful Mt. Charleston, or cold mountain as Lilah liked to call it.
It really wasn’t that cold. Who knew 62 degrees could be so warm.
I don’t think we made it to Mt. Charleston, more like Lee Canyon.
We just went to some camping grounds to try to eat our food and enjoy some hiking and exploring.

We picked up some Kentucky Fried Chicken and headed towards the mountain.
We tried to eat outside in the beautiful weather but some bee’s or wasps liked our chicken and pretty much swarmed us.
( A swarm consists of more than 4 bees being around our site at once.)
Poor Reagan was totally freaked out by them, as was Julie, and they were both having a hard time, though Julie was trying to not act scared.
My girls were mostly OK unless the bee/ wasp flew around their face.
I suggested we eat in our cars so Julie agreed and we headed back to our original picnic spot. (We went to three different spots before we gave up because of the bees/wasp.)

Eating in the car.

Take a picture of me eating chicken mom!

Eden has proven to be my adventurous child. She would wander off without anyone near her. She did stay in eye range, but only because I kept reminding her to not go to far.

Take a picture of me holding the rock!

Eden, come back here!

We took a hike in the woods. Lilah loved the woods.

Wait, where’d Eden go?

We found a large tree that had been cut down.

This was the best out of the 2 pictures I took.

After being in the woods we decided to take a walk along the road.

They wanted to hold onto the stroller, at first.

Eden and Lilah both wanted to wander into the woods later so we distracted them by making them run to places.

Do these pants make my diaper look big?

Lilah’s hives came out a little with the running so we made her walk with us as Reagan and Eden ran ahead.

We had a fun day.

Eden slept for the 45 minutes home and decided that was enough nap for the day. Lilah never took a nap. In fact I think she’s going on nap strike.

… when you’ve woken up too early consistently and you take too long of naps when your child comes out from their nap and wakes you from yours and you think:

“5 am, it can’t be 5 am? Where’s Jon? Wait it’s daytime still. It’s 5 pm.”

As a kid I remember field trips to the Lied Discovery Children’s Museum. Well, one field trip. There were all sorts of cool things and a room that was an optical illusion type room. It’s hard to describe because it was so long ago, but it’s also just hard to describe.

I took my girls there today and I saw a lot of the same things that were there about 15 years ago when I went.

Like a huge doll that had organs in it, and bubble stations and then these wheels you turn for optical illusions and the big ball with electricity lines that when you put your hand on it it attracts the electricity, I think that’s what it was anyways. I’m hoping that the doll had been replaced during this time but I’m sure the optical illusion wheels had not because they just weren’t working, or really turning.

They had exhibits that had changed or were newer. Like this survive a hurricane booth and a fake grocery store and bank with a broken atm, or the card was broken, I’m not sure which. They also had this train exhibit that was “visiting”. Lilah wanted me to cover her ears while she pulled the cord for the whistle, but she wasn’t strong enough on her own, something that replayed itself when the girls wanted me to lift them on this “lift yourself”  thing. I had a hard time pulling my own daughters let alone the thought of an eight year old doing it alone.

The girls had lots of fun. I forgot my camera, so I feel bad because there were some cute moments.

They  liked the bubble station. We got to be in a bubble a couple times. It wasn’t working when we first got there but a worker put more solution in it and describe the best way to get the bubble to work.
They also had this desert exploration area for kids five and under. The girls actually liked the ‘baby oasis’ and played in there so it became more like a ‘toddler oasis’ as I describe by a slightly disgruntled worker when she passed by a doorway I was sitting next to. There was only one baby in the whole area and 4 toddlers, and at least I made my girls follow the rules and take their shoes off, unlike the other toddlers.

This desert area had wheels to turn to pull some buckets along, and the wheels were also hard to turn for me as an adult. Lilah could do it, but it took forever and was not simple enough so she lost interest before any cause and affect could be seen. They still had fun, but I think certain teaching tools were lost within the ‘too difficult to handle by themselves’ exhibit for children.

Upstairs there were these air instruments that worked on whatever, where you put your hand in and it plays notes. Lilah thought they were too loud so she had her fingers in her ears for about 2/3rds of the time we were upstairs. It wasn’t that loud so I feel this is just a way for her to get attention at times.
We examined our hands under a microscope that used a computer monitor. Eden had gunk on her nails.

We were there for 3 hours, so with the free passes and my $1 off the regular admission price with AAA I think it was overall worth it.
I don’t think I’d pay $7- but maybe just $6 with AAA- for one child, especially a young child, for the experience. Maybe $3 per child but then you have the cost of me as an adult too. Some things in Vegas are just to expensive to do regularly or are just too expensive for the overall experience.

The museum has a yearly pass that you can buy where you spend like $50 for an all year pass and then just $5 for each pass after that, but the overall exhibits don’t change often enough that I’d want to go there even once a month, well maybe I could do once a month, but that’s only while the girls are young and still find moving fake fruit around very amusing. (They did it for like 15 minutes and would have even longer I’m sure if other girls hadn’t invaded their territory.)

The girls also really enjoyed this tunnel area and played on it for the last half hour we were there. It just warmed them up for us going to the evil McDonald’s, which to Jon is evil but not so evil to me so I just go there by myself with the girls. (We both agree that Valde–Mart is evil. I can’t even say it’s real name. 🙂 )

The girls spilt chocolate milk, well Eden spilt her chocolate milk and Lilah ate all her apple slices and 3 1/2 nuggets, which is an accomplishment in its own, since they rarely eat even half of any fast food meal. They had fun in the play area and played with a boy around Lilah’s age, or that was 4. We shared an ice cream cone, which is one of the two reasons I like Mc Donald’s, the apple pies being the other reason.
We came home, put Eden to bed and Lilah entertained herself until she stubbornly did not want to go to bed.

I like doing free to cheap things with my girls. As the Fall comes we can go to parks but once winter hits we’ll be nearly completely inside bound, so I’ll need to find other things to do with them that cost little to nothing.
I wanted to use the free passes before field trips would be taken by classes. It got kinda busy, but nothing like it would have been with a third grade class running around.

This summer we participated in the local libraries reading program, well it was really Clark County’s reading program. Even though my girls don’t read, if I read to them or did different activities it would count. So for the prizes for reading 20 books were: a free book for each girl, a book bag to take to the library and a free pass to the Lied Discovery Children’s Museum for each girl, I think we got a free pencil also and put into drawing for a vacation type trip that we obviously didn’t win, dang it.
Yesterday Sam and I were going to go to the museum together so the girls could play and explore together, but after Labor day it’s closed Mondays except school holidays. So I may have to go by myself with the girls this Wednesday, the only other day I don’t have Naia this week.
Since the museum was closed Sam suggested we come over and have the girls swim with Britta in the kiddy pool they bought on clearance at Target. My girls had lots of fun, and so did Britta for the first 10 minutes. Sam said she’s not one to stay outside for long, even if she has been begging to go outside. Lilah and Eden were having lots fun sliding into the pool so they played until almost noon. Then we made my girls get out of the pool and we had lunch and then the girls played in Britta’s room. I was there for a very long time, so I’m thankful to Sam for letting us stay and play. She was doing cleaning while I was there, but I’m totally fine with that if I’m at someones house for a long period of time.
We left and on the way home stopped and registered Lilah for her gymnastics class at the community center. I’m seeing how well she likes the tumbling and whatever they’ll be doing because she enjoyed dance, but she likes to do more trick type stuff and balancing when she’s at home. I’ll probably have her do gymnastics in the fall and dance in the spring. Though if she’s continually excited about gymnastics I might keep her in it, because her excitement for dance weaned off, but that may have been because she just wanted to stay and play with Britta instead of go to class. I think she might like dance this year because they also get to do tap, but she’d have to try it at least.

So today I have Naia and too slightly ornery girls. Lilah wants us to go somewhere, she really wants to go to the park, but she always wants to go somewhere, and I’m just not ready to venture out where I’d be alone and responsible for 3 girls and have no help.

I’m a baby. I know it.

We do a game where we pretend to snore and recently I’ve made it so you have to kiss the person to wake them up. I snore and Eden kisses me so I say “Thank you for waking me up”. She snores and I kiss Eden and then she tells me “Thank you for kisses and waking me up.” It’s too cute.
We’ve also taught Eden to kiss on demand of any puckering lips. I love getting kisses from my girls but I teased that we could be doing a bad thing to teach Eden to always give kisses.

Funny thing of the day.
The girls were fighting and Jon went back there.
Jon- “What are you doing?”
Eden- “We’re fighting.”
At least she was honest in which Lilah usually gives some excuse, Eden took this, or I want this. It was just a straight up answer from Eden.
I suppose this might be more amusing to us as parents because of the cute voice Eden used and it goes with my thought on Eden conversing more and giving correct answers. “We’re fighting.” te-he-he. She’s so cute.

I love this age.

A lot of people are happy about fall and winter coming. I’m just a little sad that the summer passed so quickly.
I had planned on taking the girls swimming weekly.
It happened three times.I would have taken them this week but Lilah’s had a fever for three days straight and now we’re getting to just 100, instead of 110 degrees, which seems cool right now, or at least not hot enough to swim in. Anyone need the swimmer diapers next summer? I have about 20 left and Eden better be potty trained by then.

I had planned on finishing my drapes.
I still have one bare window.

I had planned on reading some books and maybe organizing more.
I haven’t even completely read the book I chose for book club and we’ve had like 3 months to read it. And my house is no more organized than when I did this months ago.

Summer passes to quickly.

The girls like hot chocolate as a treat after dinner and tonight I made them and myself some.
As I sipped my hot chocolate in my 81 degreed house I thought about how I love to drink hot chocolate on a cold winters night, and how much I want to splurge and buy Stephen’s hot chocolate in like every flavor. I was sweating a little as I drank my Kroger brand hot chocolate, but the winter will be coming fast.
How I wished we had fall colors in Vegas, but we don’t unless you go to UNLV’s campus for the two days a few trees turn red across from the LDS institute of religion.
We just get cold and then leaves fall off and it gets colder and when you think it’s just gonna keep getting colder we start warming up.

Ahh Winter, it’s like Fall all Winter long in Vegas.

Today was Andrea’s baby shower. Not many people RSVPed and there was another girl from UNLV who had a shower today also, plus it was a holiday weekend. So we had about 5 guest to start out, then us 4 Harvey girls and my mom, then after I did games and Andrea began opening presents 1 guest came with her daughter and grand baby and then 2 more also showed up.
So it was small and got off to a slow start but I think they had fun. I hope anyways.

We played a game where I had 20 questions about Andrea and her pregnancy, we measured the belly and then we did a price is right game. Instead of doing the memory game we had the products and they had to match them to one of the prices listed. Most of what I bought I got on clearance, so in total I paid about 65-70% of what all the prices came to. People were surprised to actually look at the normal retail prices of things, it was kinda funny.
I didn’t do the pin game, though I think it might have added a little fire to the group had Julie been on the look out for those who had their legs crossed or said baby, depending on the twist we gave it.

I think it went well overall and once the presents were done with there was a lot of conversing.

I was a little sad that it was a small turn out. I tried to get good gifts for the games, also things that were on clearance but nice, and have fun food, we had chocolate fondue. We also had chocolate covered popcorn for the guests to take home. I guess all that matters is that Andrea had a good time and that those who were there did too.
Since we had it on the other side of town, Carolyn’s new house is at Mountain’s Edge near Blue Diamond and Rainbow, I think some people may have been deterred to come. Part of me feels bad if that was a reason, but the valley is so big now that no where is going to be convenient for all and so I guess if you wanted to be there you were.
I think once everyone was there, a total of 14 adults, 3 toddlers and 2 babies, it was just the right size for Carolyn’s house.
I had Jon come with me so he could keep an eye on the girls and so those who know the girls, but don’t see them, could see them. Such as Veronica from UNLV, who brought her granddaughter so Andrea could meet her, and Deniece, whom Andrea use to work with and knows me too. I also think they’re cute and like to show them off.:) So kids were not not aloud but we did want to keep it to where they would be supervised by their parent since Carolyn and Derek’s home isn’t exactly child friendly.

Over all I think it went well. We actually had one person show up after all the guest had left, but that’s when she was able to come.
I’m happy Carolyn let us use her house, and I had fun going over there the night before and putting together furniture and rearranging furniture so it would be ready for Saturday. I tried to put the couch chair back to where it was but I’m sure Derek will have to fix it.

Eden feel asleep on the way home, in which she had to sleep on our bed because her bed is covered in toys from before we left.
Lilah feel asleep and then Jon and I feel asleep on the couch. We woke up about 7 and got dinner, which was cereal, around 7:30.
I actually haven’t eaten yet.

I now need to go over my lesson a little for church and write a talk for Lilah.
Even though we killed Derek’s printer my sister Kristi has an extra one that they’re willing to give us. Hopefully we don’t somehow kill this one too! (knock on wood), but it is a really nice one and fairly new.

We had lunar eclipse the other night. Jon set the alarm to be up at like 2:30am or when it when it would transition from a partial to full eclipse. I awoke at some time, but was afraid to get up and then shortly after Jon jumped out of bed. It was like 4:30am and we had missed the full lunar eclipse but we went and saw the moon as a partial lunar eclipse.
Jon was then too awake to sleep so he went to the living room to study and I was pretty awake but I lied in bed trying to sleep but instead I stayed up thinking about the baby shower for Andrea this weekend.
We finally made it to sleep later, but I’m sure Jon didn’t get much sleep before he had to be up for work and school.

I did lots of shopping yesterday with some girls. One in particular whined a lot while at the first store so I threatened that once we got to the library she wouldn’t be able to pick out any books unless she was good at the next two stores. I gave her three strikes and she only took two. Once at the library both girls just played with some toys and I actually picked out all the books but one or two which Eden wanted.
At least the threat kept Lilah from whining so much while at the store.

Last night Janice Kapp Perry and her husband Douglas spoke at a fireside for the women of three stakes in our area.
It was really fun and I learned that her and her husband have quite a sense of humor.
She told the story of the first thing he ever said to her. They had many classes together but he hadn’t seemed to notice her, then right before she was to do some clarinet solo thing for her class she was nervous and while she tried to focus he said to her “I bet those lips are made for something better than playing the clarinet,” or something to that liking. After she said this he came up to defend himself and she just held onto the mic so he couldn’t respond so then he gave her a big kiss. She replied that she wouldn’t ever tell that story again…..or maybe she would.
Basically they talked about the influence of good music in the home and one point she made was if you’re satisfied with you life, or even bored and thinking now what, take little steps to accomplish some secret dream or goal. Each step accomplished should be a victory so even if you don’t get to the actual goal you should celebrate what you’ve actually done.
Also you’re never too old to try something new and develop a new talent.
She actually didn’t begin her major song writing career until she was 40 or so. She broke her ankle playing basketball with the kids, which was her life, and her husband asked if she could find something a little less dangerous for her age. She had studied music in college, but hadn’t done any song writing or composing since then.
While her ankle healed she wrote the original songs for a rode show for church and continued from there basically.

It was a fun fireside.