Is It Naptime Yet

Saturday we had a few events.

I had a bridal shower to attend, which I brought Eden with me. Lilah had her primary program practice, which Jon took her too since I was at a bridal shower.

After the bridal shower I headed over to the chapel to watch the end of the practice. This was to be Jon’s study time so I was trying to stay out of the house. After the practice we headed over to Sam’s to decorate the playhouse and get the backyard presentable for the party on Monday. Sam’s husband mowed the lawn and tidied out the play house. He killed three black widows that were living under the few pieces of wood he had in there. We didn’t see any after that.  I cleaned off some bikes and outside toys. I killed 5 spiders in the process. It makes me wonder what spiders we might have on the girl’s, not played with very often, outside toys.

We returned home around 5:30 and had dinner that night.

Sunday was Lilah’s primary program. We tried to get to the church early, but ended up there right on time. Luckily, Jon’s mom and sister Dara were there early and were able to save a pew for us. My mom, Carolyn, mother-in-law, and sister-in-law Dara came to watch Lilah in the program.

Lilah was one of the more enunciated children in her age bracket. Her line was “The scriptures teach me about Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and how to return to them.” Lilah was on the left side of the podium and consequently could not see the conductor when they sang songs. Her and her other two classmates seemed to focus on whatever suited them. They still did pretty well on singing and were very well behaved.

During one song Lilah started playing with her curly hair. She was fluffing it and bringing pieces over her head and then did a classic hair toss. Jon said she was practicing for her shampoo commercial days.
She was really cute and we had lots of fun watching her.

I gave the closing prayer, or benediction, and had to teach Gospel Principles so we headed right to class.

Story about the closing prayer.
Last week Jon was asked by the executive secretary if he and I would give the prayers for sacrament. Jon declined for himself but said he would give the message to his wife. He gave me the message and we left it at that.
Sunday we showed up right on time, but I wasn’t positive I would be giving the benediction.  We got there and I looked in our bulletin, but it said: Benediction- By invitation.
So I listened intently to see if they would announce who was giving the closing prayer.
They didn’t.
We sang the closing song and I had my eye out to see if anyone else would stand to give the prayer, particularly the wife of the brother who had said the invocation. She didn’t move so I quickly got up to say the closing prayer. Luckily we were close to the front and I had the isle seat.
It frazzled me for the rest of the day since I get really nervous speaking from the pulpit and because of my confusion.

Jon ushered the girls to their classes and I ushered Carolyn and my in-laws to my class. The class did not go as smoothly as I would have liked, but I guess that’s just the way it is some days. ( I was teaching and with our busy schedule had not gone over it has much as I should have, plus it wasn’t really a big discussion lesson and I had family, which do make me a little more nervous.)
We then went to Relief Society and then to our house.

My MIL made the stop by our house to see my painted bedroom and finished curtains. I think it’s been nearly two years since she’s been to our house and she was interested in seeing our few, and minor, improvements. She and Dara only stayed for a short time since she needed to get back to my FIL.

Carolyn spent the day with us because we had family home evening that night, and it was at the Lee’s house, who live just a couple miles up the street from us, and she lives on the other side of town, like 20 miles one way.

She entertained my children while I did some much needed house work. We also made the sugar cookies that were for decorating at the party the next day.

At family home evening we saw our first cousin’s once removed little girl, who was not yet three weeks old.

All these babies make me want to have a baby, but that will have to wait.

After a night of family we came home and I slept through the make-up yoga class on  Monday morning.

Last night we went to our first Halloween party of the season, we have four total. It was for my sister Carolyn’s work. The parties are for families, and since she has no kids, and even when she does I hope she continues to invite us, she invites us to be her family.

My girls love Carolyn’s work, though you wouldn’t know it by the expressions on their faces. Whenever we go, even on regular days, they’re so excited to see Carolyn. People at Carolyn’s work love my girls and sometimes I wish my girls were as excited as the people who see them are.  Lilah has become more outgoing, but Eden has become more reserved.

Anyways, as I was checking the time and trying to figure out when we needed to leave I realized I hadn’t called animal control on the cat we had caught the night before. I called, but they were not coming as quickly as I needed them too, so Jon had to come home, rather than stay on campus and study, so we could head out to the party. Since I wanted to be ready as soon as possible, in case animal control came quickly, the girls sat in their costumes and make-up for around an hour and a half. I had PBS kids on in hopes they wouldn’t touch their faces too much, and they did a pretty good job.  (I was going to go to JoAnn’s before the party, but we had to go after.)

Jon got home so we gave quick hugs and left. (Animal control came around 7, I think we were probably a last stop back to the office since we’re close by it, so it was a good thing Jon came home.)

We got to the party and ate. I had the girls on an empty desk which had a wall behind it, and many people commented on how cute they were, and some even said they thought they were apart of the decorations since they were siting so nice and still.

We went trick or treating to each office and the girls even went into a haunted office. Eden was holding my hand very tightly. A witch that had been going around, who scared and made almost every child cry who was under the age of 5 except my girls, was in the office. There were a lot of witch cackles, which made Eden nervous, but they did well and made it out OK. It was “just the right amount of scary” Lilah said,  according to my sister Carolyn’s blog.

Carolyn’s boss, Tim, was dressed up and sitting in one of their rooms to scare the kids. He gently got Lilah and mostly just hugged and gave her a few kisses, I think she was only slightly scared, but we told her it was Tim, so she seemed OK with it. When I took a picture of him with the girls, Eden was definitely not enjoying sitting on his lap, and even when he took the pantyhose off his head she was weary of him, though Eden’s pretty much weary of everyone lately.

It was lots of fun and the girls were pretty happy with their loot.

Lilah with her hair braided to crimp it.

My scary ghosts.

The girls with Tim. He was scarier with the lights out, which they were but I have a good flash.

The loot.

Friday was a good day. I knew it would be since we had planned on going to the Springs Preserve with Sam, Britta, and they brought Izaak along, a young boy from the mommy class we use to do.

Before heading to the Springs Preserve we went to Trader Joe’s and my in-laws house.

At noon we meet Sam and the gang. The kids ate lunch and played. Britta split her lip open, but other than that it was a mostly smooth afternoon.

The kiddos had lots of fun and Sam and I were able to chat  and get adult conversation in. We actually talked about more than kid stuff, like politics, which luckily we agree so it was a pleasant conversation. Fortunately, our conversations are pretty broad and I am able to talk to Sam about a lot of different things.

We did the usual activities and then the girls and I headed out before leaving Sam, Britta, and Izaak there.

We stopped by a local gas station to use our gas cards. They’re only $10 each and you have to do a complete transaction for each one. As in pump gas, return nozzle, wait for a receipt and repeat. I had to figure this out, so it was rather annoying.

Then we headed over to a local store I rarely visit, one, because It’s on the way to places I go, but not really on the way home and two, it’s not a very tidy store. They had the fun sized candy bar bags on sale for $1.50, which are usually $2-$2.50, on sale.  I bought eight bags for Halloween and I guess  to gain a lot of weight with. Usually we have to buy candy for Halloween and the trunk or treat, so eight is about right, but this year, once again, our ward is having the ward party on Halloween, which I’m so against, so I’m not supporting the activity in any way, where as last year I think I still donated candy. I just don’t like ward activities on Halloween night.

We bought lots of candy and the cashier was nice enough to ring it up twice for us, because there was a limit of four bags per transaction. I didn’t know, so I would have stuck to the limit, but it was very nice of here.

Friday night was normal.

Saturday I was busy cleaning and trying to create order in our house of chaos. I then sewed the skirt on finally. I’ve actually finish everything on the dress, except the buttons, because we don’t have enough and we’re waiting for them to be transferred to a closer store.

Saturday night the girls and I gave Jon some study time by going to JoAnn’s and then to Carolyn’s work to help her office decorate for the Halloween party. It was fun, the girls had tons of fun and Lilah now prays for a very scary Halloween.

Sunday was a normal day.

Monday I made the apron.

Today I’m working on the pantaloons, which I didn’t buy enough lace for so they won’t get done till Thursday or Friday, or after I go to JoAnn’s again.

Now I just need to cut out the bonnet and sew it together.

I’m almost done with the costume.

Then next week I’ll begin table runners for my friends wedding, which have to be done by the 15th of November.

I’ve never made table runners, so I’m a little nervous. I’m mostly nervous about cutting the fabric completely straight so the seams turn out straight and so they’re retanglular table runners and not trapezoidal or some other parallelogram.
I think I’m a little crazy.

My apron and robe will probably be Christmas presents to myself.

I think the girls are preparing themselves for changing from daylight savings time back to standard.

We’ve put them to bed at the same time, with the same naps, and they’ve been waking up around 8 or 8:30 am, or an hour later than normal. This is really odd for Eden to being doing this. She usually wakes up bright and early at 7 or even 6:30 am, but for whatever reason has been sleeping in and then does not want to take a nap.

Take right now for example. She’s still in her room making noises and asking when she can come out.

Sigh.

On Sunday Eden skipped a nap, but that was also due to me wanting to put the girls to bed early so they would wake up at 7:30 am to get ready for dance at 9 am since they slept in till 8 on Sunday too. (Eden didn’t take a nap Saturday due to making too much noise and I guess being excited about going to Chuck E’ Cheese that night. She also woke up at 8:30 on Saturday. See a pattern here?)

I’m not ready for both my girls to be awake all day long. Lilah’s not ready for Eden to be awake.

When we let Eden stay awake on Sunday she was so upset that the TV was off and she was missing her PBS kids. Once we told her PBS kids was not on on Sunday she was fine.  (Since Lilah normally sleeps later she doesn’t watch any, if much, TV in the morning, while Eden usually wakes up and does, if she’s not playing. So Lilah’s TV time is during Eden’s nap.)

I had a hard time when Lilah stopped taking her nap. The afternoon would be my time to nap, read, watch TV, and especially eat snacks I didn’t like to share with the girls. (I admit I’m a closet sugar eater and I regulate my girls sugar intake in hopes that they will be better at managing their sweet tooth’s. )

Lilah also has an afternoon snack, so Eden will need an afternoon snack, and that means one more person to share my yogurt with.

I want my alone time.

Why can’t they both take naps at my command?

Last night a cold front came in. Jon’s been doing a graph with the girls where they record the temperature every night at 7:30. Thursday night it was 81 degrees, Friday night it was 69!

Today we’re suppose to be in the 60’s all day. Yikes! This is pretty normal for Vegas in the Fall. We get a large drop in temperature, then it usually warms up a little and then we get  another drop and it stays colder though, it might warm up a little once again.

I was pulling out the long sleeves and pants and I realized I have nothing for Lilah but two shirts. All her clothes are 4T and even though her ankles look so cute peeking out the bottom of her too short pants, they just ain’t gonna work for winter.

Eden’s has a few 3T’s, but not a lot so I’m gonna have to beef up her wardrobe too.

I may do a little shopping today for the basics because I want to be prepared for the winter and I like clothes shopping, even if it’s for the girls and not me.

On Friday our home school meet up group made plans for the group to attend Bonnie Springs. We were able to attend on school prices. It was $2 per adult and $1 per child, compared to the normal rate of $20 a car.

I’ve never been to Bonnie Springs so the thought of wearing shoes, over sandals which I wear as much as possible, never crossed my mind. So here’s a warning if you go to the petting zoo at Bonnie Springs wear shoes. We were able to avoid any messes, but man are you aware of the free roaming animals which leave their poop around when you’re in sandals.

The girls loved the animals. At first I thought all the animals were in cages but as we ventured farther we saw a free roaming rooster, and then the donkey, a couple deer and then we saw a llama and some goats. I think the friendlier animals were free roaming, but their was a very feisty goat that was head butting and chasing the other goats. That was a little scary when you have a front row seat.

I forgot to call my friend Beth about canceling the dress fitting for her daughter. So she called me and while I was talking to her I looked over to see one of the deer eating Lilah’s shirt! I was unable to get a picture but she was so happy and just giggling away at this deer eating her shirt. I did get a picture of the deer while another little girl was feeding him.

While we were just beginning our exploration we walked into a small area but a llama apparently wanted out, so he kinda forced us to move out of the small walkway. Lilah thought it was hilarious, as you’ll see in the video, but Eden was freaked out by it and could not get away from the large llama fast enough. I think that made her very weary of all the animals and she only touched a ferret that a worker held for the girls to pet.

We saw lots of interesting animals and the girls loved seeing each of them.

After the petting zoo we wandered around the old town Bonnie Springs and then watched a melodrama that two ‘actors’, I use the term loosely, put on. They then had a very cheesy shooting and hanging skit.

We wandered around some more and then ate our lunch in the car off of Charleston, or a pull-off to some hike. It was a beautiful day and perfect for being outside. We watched two monarch butterflies go by our car. I think it’s migration time for them.

Here are the pictures of our adventure. The song is by Jim Gill and is called The Sound Effects Song. I only used the first half, since I’m only showing 20 pictures and the first half goes with where we were, kinda.

Last week my eldest brother Glenn got remarried to a wonderful woman, AnnMarie.

They had the wedding in the chapel, so no picture taking was allowed. My battery started to die during the reception so I have some pictures, but we probably would have taken more had it not died.

The reception was held immediately after the wedding. Things went pretty quick so I wasn’t able to get a picture of them cutting the cake, since I was returning from taking Eden to the bathroom when I realized they were cutting the cake, and the camera was in my purse.

Here’s my view, with a few pictures that Jon took, of Glenn and AnnMarie’s wedding.

Bride and groom with parents. AnnMarie, Maggie Harvey, Larry Harvey, Glenn, and Norman Homer.

Shawn, the best man, with baby Zarina.

Dad and Glenn.

Part of our table: Katy, Eden, Lilah, and Jon.

Beautiful Carolyn.

Amusing story: I was eating right handed with Eden on my lap. It was quite awkward and we kept getting in each others way. Carolyn suggest I eat left handed, and I mentioned that I would probably drop my food since I was right handed. She said “Look it’s not that hard.” and attempted to eat with her left hand only to drop the grape on the floor. Point proven and very funny at the time.

Cute Zarina.

The cut cake.

Derek is so GQ. It makes me want to have his soda.

How much food can Lilah fit in her mouth?

Wait, Carolyn’s back. Let’s take a picture of the happy couple…Well, at least one of them is happy.

Having fun with Daddy.

Cute Eden.

The couple dancing.

Look over there so I can steal your food.

(Dad and Mom with neighbors Nancy and husband…I can’t remember his name.)

The crazy Parks, Andrea, Zarina, and Brien. One is definitely a little crazier than the others.

Glenn dancing with Mom.

Getting the car ready. This was just the beginning.

Eden was never in the confetti filled car helping to put toilet paper on the seat belts, I swear.

Having fun.

One sad thing. We decorated the car, only to have the couple slip away without anyone knowing.

Yesterday a new season of Fetch with Ruff Ruffman started on PBS. This is one of Lilah’s favorite shows. I was sewing so I mostly listened in.

That night at dinner Lilah told Jon how she saw a new episode of Fetch, and they had given the kids new names. I had seen that the contestants were different so I commented on how they were all new people. Lilah insisted that one of them was the same kid as last time.

Since I caught the tail end of the show I saw that once again they had an African American boy, like the previous two seasons. I learned in a criminal justice class that cross racial identification is difficult and often the witness incorrectly identifies if the suspect is a different race , especially when it’s a Caucasian identifying an African American.   I figured she thought it was the same African American boy from the last season.

I put my theory to test and asked Lilah who was the same kid. She replied the brown haired boy. There was a white boy with brown hair and he came on screen before the  black boy. I asked if it was him, she replied no. I then pointed out the black boy and she replied yes.

So my knowledge of cross racial identification gave me some amusement today.

I haven’t forgotten all I learned in college after all.

These aren’t the best pictures, but they were the best I could find.

Could you tell the difference between them?

I was giving the girls a bath this morning. I must not do this often enough because they were asking, “Where are we going?”. My reply nowhere, which is only partially true.

They need a bath ’cause it’s that time of the week, they get baths twice a week unless something makes them unusually stinky. I just don’t see the need to bath my children every day when they’re little and don’t produce body odor and it can be a big chore. Just see it as one way I’m conserving water for our drought ridden valley. They also need a bath because we’re running errands tomorrow and we’ll be spending lots of money since it’s the start of a new month, which means a new budget, which means I can spend a lot.  Well, I won’t be spending that much, but  we will be going to a few places and it will add up.  (Picking up contacts, buying fabric, going to lunch with Anna, going to Costco, buying gas…maybe even Target.) I have a lot of errands I’ve needed to run but have been putting off because of a couple of reasons, the first being the budget, the second being they’re all in Henderson and until I can spend money I should wait to go run errands. I could have picked up my glasses and contacts, buy why do that and waste the gas when I need to buy fabric and food out there too?

Anyways, I get sidetracked easily, if this was a phone conversation you’d probably have tuned me out by now, or in this case maybe you’ve stopped reading, but this post is for two particular people so all that really matters is they read this.

Eden was waiting to get her hands washed and wondering why they took a bath and said she wanted to go see Carolyn. I said we weren’t going to see Carolyn today but we might tomorrow while we run errands and have lunch with Anna.

Eden replies: “Anna and Carolyn are my best friends.”

So there you go, Eden loves Anna and Carolyn  a lot, I’m not even a best friend, I’m just the mom. 😉

I also love it because they’re a couple of my best friends too.

Update:
Just now Eden was wanting to talk and play with Lilah, but Lilah did not want to play. Eden was next to our fridge and I’m making lunch. Eden says she doesn’t have a friend to talk to, so I say she can talk to me. She says she’ll just talk to herself. I really am just the mom.

I’m not sure why I’m titling this post “Monkeys”, but I had a couple thoughts I wanted to jot down.

The first thought is something I overheard Lilah say to Eden this morning.

“That’s my throw-up bowl, don’t play with it!”

Thankfully it was never used, nor do I think Lilah really needed it, but she said her stomach hurt.

Something I said:

“Let her play with the bowl, you never threw-up in it. It’s fine.”

Also Eden takes after me in a silly way, besides looking just like me.

She is obsessed with tickling us. At home, at the store. She likes to take her hair and tickle you with her hair and once she decides to tickle you she keeps tickling you, for like a long time, at any place and at random times. I have to tell her not to bend down on the dirty store floor and tickle my feet at times. I think she starts playing with her hair and just decides it would be fun to tickle someone and whatever part of you which is easiest to reach, she tickles.

I also like to tickle my family members, but I don’t use my hair, nor do I tickle feet, unless you’re a member of my little family. I think they have cute feet to tickle, and eat, but I only “eat” their feet after a bath, ’cause it’s just gross any other time. ( Just for clarification, I will tickle Jon’s feet, but I will never play “eat” his feet, they are way to big and have hair, and that’s just gross to eat feet on anyone older than like…seven, or whatever age I decide to stop eating my girls feet. Their feet may be forever cute, but once they’re bigger than my 6 1/2 sized feet I’d definitely stop. )

So there are some random fun memories and an insight to my craziness.

Remind me not to write blogs after being awake for 17 hours and only getting 5 hours of sleep the night before. I know some might call this motherhood, I call it torture.  I need 8 hours of sleep.