Mom Turns 60!

A couple weekends ago we celebrated Mom's 60th birthday.  The kids, my Dad (who is living with us right now) and I, loaded up the car and made the drive.  Jason had to stay home to study for finals.  We left Thursday afternoon and drove back Tuesday, but it was worth the trip, even if it was super short.  

We had lots of people at the main event.  Sunday evening we gathered around with Uncle Robert and his family, the Taylor family (Lindsay's sister that we love), Kathleen Skidmore, Uncle Jim and of course, all the Matt and Nancy Hickman family and their kiddos.  We had a great dinner and the weather was fabulous, so we were able to enjoy the backyard.  

Mom's gift this year was extra special.  Lindsay gathered from every child and grandchild three reasons why we love Mom.  Blaine arranged for the 60 balloons and the different "reasons" were taped on.  Heidi and Blaine read them allowed as the balloon train got shorter and shorter.  Some of the words of love were funny, but most were sentimental and very touching.  Everything from "She has waffles" from Ella to words about how thoughtful and happy she makes us all feel.  

All of the words were compiled into a beautiful book that Lindsay made.  It was awesome!  

Freddie, Benny, George, Lucy, Archie, Abby, Mom, Simon, Graham, Ella, Oliver, Thomas

Here's Mom with all her grand babies.  

The originals.  I sure love my fam.  

I love this picture.  Every time my family sings "Happy Birthday" to someone, we sing it as horribly and as crazy as possible.  That's what's happening here.  Check out the amazing cake that Lindsay made.  

 Here's some of the crazies enjoying dessert in the treehouse.  

Happy Birthday, Mom!  We love you!

Surviving Conference

This post should have been named, "Helping the Kids Survive Conference" instead.  I always look forward to General Conference and the chance to hear from our prophet and other leaders.  But at the same time, I always dread the constant nagging and fighting that goes along with trying to keep them entertained while helping them learn how important it is for them to try and listen.  Tough stuff.  

So, in an effort to feel like I have some sort of control, I did some research on pinterest and decided on this little idea.  I set up a little store on our kitchen table before conference began.  The kids were soooo curious and excited about all the stuff and price tags I was laying out.  I didn't get a picture of our conference bucks, but they each started with a couple "bucks". 

They could earn money by being quiet during the talks and then more money if they could tell me something they learned from the talk.  Or, in Graham's case, a word or two that they may have mentioned (we were trying to make this a positive experience).  

After two talks, the store opened up again and the negotiated and planned out their purchases.

I got all the stuff at the 99 cent store or in the dollar area at Target.  I bought a couple of the little buckets to put some of the stuff in, too.  It was totally and completely worth the $15-$20 I spent.  It worked beautifully.  Even when they got a little squirrelly during the 2nd session on Sunday, I just had to remind them of some of the stuff they wanted to buy and they got back to business.  

 It was a lot of fun!  Definitely a tradition we will add to our list.  

Just Because....

Poor buddy.  This kid could probably use a good nap most days, but it usually doesn't happen until he holds still for a bit.  

Graham and Junior striking a pose.

The kids have been loving the pool this month.  Last week the water started to be warm enough for the kiddos to get in and stay in for a long time.  They've been "swimming" since the beginning of April, but that mostly consisted of them jumping in and quickly jumping out and playing around the pool instead of mostly in it.  

Brooklyn, Adrianna, Lucy
 

The Tale of the Abandoned Kittens

Just look at that smiling face.  Let me just say, this saga contains much more sobbing, cries of despair, and gnashing of teeth then bright smiling faces and happiness.  Here's how it went down:

Back at the end of March, Lucy was outside rollerblading with her neighbor friend, Adrianna.  It had been a crazy day....Thursday.  Thursdays are Jason's long day at school when he doesn't get home until after 8:00 pm.  I was still sick (pregnancy post still to come) and was attempting to get Graham and Benny bathed after they rolled around in the dirt at a softball game we attended.  Both boys were in the shower when Lucy comes in frantically yelling, "We found kittens!  They are in the sprinklers!"  

Let me pause here and remind my readers that I don't like animals.  Let me rephrase or attempt to explain.  I like animals, but do not like them in my house, or in my hands/arms, or too close to me.  

Back to the story.  Lucy was trying to explain to me what she and Adrianna had found, but it was hard to understand her as I was rinsing the shampoo out of Ben's hair.  I told her she was just going to have to wait until I was done.  

I situate the boys and then head down to the alleged "sprinkler kittens".  Lucy is there with her friend looking at this pack of 5 kittens huddled together, soaking wet.  All I originally see is disease, filth, and scariness.  I yell for her not to touch them and back away.  Before I can even make it down to where they stand, Lucy is already begging to keep all or at least one of them.  

Pause again.  Really?  Not sure who Lucy thought she was dealing with at this point.  Apparently, not the "we will never be getting a dog or cat" mother that has raised her these past nine years.

Back to story.  She has, of course, anticipated my answer and is already going into tirades about how mean I am and how my hate for animals is so horrifying, etc., etc.  All the while I am trying to figure out what we should do.  Yes, I don't like animals, but I'm also human and knew that I couldn't leave the abandoned kittens there.  No mama cat in sight.  

I restate my forceful demand to not touch them and go home to look up a shelter or animal rescue place to call.  It's now 6:00 pm.  No one is open.  I finally get a hold of an emergency vet clinic who asks all kinds of questions about their size and where I found them.  She then tells me who to get a hold of in the morning and where I can take them.  

Pause.  In the morning!  That means I have to take care of them....until the morning!  

Back to story.  I told the nice vet clinic lady that I have absolutely no idea how to care for 5 tiny kittens.  She kindly explains where I can get a little bottle and kitten formula to feed them until I take them to the Humane Society the next morning.  Yes.....kitten formula.  Me.  Maggie.  Supposed to go buy kitten formula and feed these kittens.  

So, I found a box and some old towels.  I walked back to the scene where Lucy is now talking to another neighbor who was curious and stopped to see what was going on.  The sprinklers had turned back on, so he helped them move them to a safer spot (yes...she touched them).  

After asking again if we could keep them and getting a very irritated and stern, "Absolutey Not!"  Lucy started another episode of "My Mother is the Meanest Animal Hating Mother in the Universe" as we picked them up and put them in the box.  All the while I'm wondering, "Where is Adrianna's mom?  Why did this happen while Jason was gone?  He would have thought this was kinda fun."  

We get the kittens to the house and Lucy is still going strong with the begging and the pleading.  My patience ran out about the time I finished shampooing my youngest child.  I explained/yelled to her over and over again that I am already WAY outside my comfort zone here and that I needed her to drop it.  This is where the gnashing of teeth began.  Complete meltdown.

I get the boys in their jammies, load them up all up in the car, send Lucy back inside the house to wait because there is no way I'm going to listen to her sobs all the way to and from Pet Smart (we have to get the bottle and formula, remember?).

We go to the store, get the gear, and then make our way back home.  Lucy is still crying, although, the ranting has subsided.  She met me in the garage and says, "Mom!  We HAVE to keep them.  They're brother and sisters and they'll get split up if we don't."  I don't remember how I answered that one, but we eventually made it into the house.  I got the formula in the bottle and attempted to feed one of the kittens.  No go.  Lucy was getting so upset as she watched the expression on my face as I was trying.  I told her, for the tenth time, that I was doing my best and to back off.  I decided this was a job that could wait for my sweetheart who would be returning in less than an hour.  I put a Digourno pizza in the oven (we hadn't had dinner yet) and waited as the kids watched the critters crawl around.  They hadn't moved much until they were dry and warm in the house.  They looked far less diseased and actually kinda cute by this point (still not cute enough to keep, mind you).

Jason finally made it home and was completely amazed that we had the kittens.  By this point, Lucy had stopped begging and was telling me sorry and that she understood that this was hard for me.  We had a couple more talks about how it's okay that I don't love animals as much as she does, but that I love that quality about her.  She was still very, very sad when we talked about taking them to the Humane Society the next day.

Jason was a little bit more successful in trying to feed them, but they still didn't get more than a couple drops each.  They were pretty wiped out from their sprinkler experience.  We finished our Digourno, got the kids to bed and just sat and relaxed.  Jason was in awe of the situation and just as I had predicted, thought it was kinda fun having them for a little bit.  He set his alarm and tried to feed them two other times during the night with very little success.

By morning they were crawling all over each other and seemed much more lively.  Lucy shed a tear or two as she said goodbye before school.  She held each one and spent a little extra time with the orange and white one she name, DJ.  As I'm writing this, I sense some cat lover will read this and think I'm a monster for not letting her keep one.  Let me remind you of the upcoming move to Italy.  Don't judge me.

Jason fed them one more time and they were much more lively and ate a bit more.  I snapped a few more pictures before he left to drive them to Scottsdale to the Humane Society.

It was a stressful event, but one that I won't soon forget.  Even if her incessant begging and crying made my blood boil at times, I love Lucy's tender heart and the fact that she so desperately wanted to help the kittens.  She'll probably have a houseful of dogs and cats when she's older and I'll visit her and pretend not to mind them jumping and crawling all over me.  Hopefully I will have done a good job teaching her how to keep a house clean!!  Although yesterday she informed me that she is going to have a maid.  I asked her how she will teach her kids to work and clean and she said she'd give the maid one day off a week and make her kids clean that day.  Good plan, Lucy.  Good plan.

Ragnar

Ragnar, Ragnar, Ragnar.  What a crazy experience this was.  I have heard about others doing Ragnar for years and was always a little jealous.  Not sure I'll be doing it again anytime soon, but I'm glad I got to try it out.  

I think it would have been a little different if I had known some of my fellow teammates before the event.  I happened upon our team by chance.  I was at the Deer Valley soccer team's end of year banquet when I was approached by one of the players' moms.  She asked me if I ran, I told her yes.  She was desperate to find a replacement for her because she needed to be in Utah the same weekend as Ragnar was scheduled.  She let me know that none of my 3 running legs would be more than 6 miles.  I was excited!  Perfect distances and I had always wanted to do it!  

Ragnar was only a few weeks away.  I met with some of the team a week later to learn some of the rules and what I would need to bring with me.  It was an all women's team and all of them were so nice!  A few days before the meeting, I found out I was pregnant.  I was a little nervous about running, but Jason and I both decided it was fine.  I could run those distances easily and I just felt good about it.  I knew it wouldn't be a problem.  So.....I packed my bags and got ready to get my Ragnar on....Phoenix style.  

We started the race early at 6:00 am in Wickenburg, AZ.  I was the 6th runner in my van of 6 women.  There are two vans per team, so our van ran, then I passed the baton on to the other van.  We would go rest a while and then their 12th runner would pass to our 1st runner.  Does that make sense?

This is me right before my last leg.  I had run one the afternoon before, one at 1:00 in the morning and then this one around 10:00 am.  Jason actually came and ran the night run with me.  As the evening was setting in, I realized that much of that run was in the "wilderness" and I was a little freaked out.  We got a babysitter and he met us in North Phoenix at the switch spot.  I was so glad he was there.  I was honestly pretty sick with my pregnancy and was having a hard time.  I hadn't been so nauseous with my other kids, so this came as a surprise.  The combination of being without sleep and running while wanting to puke was no fun at all.  We hadn't had a chance to talk about our big move to Italy yet, so we had an hour to visit and dream a little bit about the upcoming adventure.  I dry heaved a couple times, but him being there made it so I could think about something else for a while.  

After my night run, we went and crashed at Bree's house for a couple hours.  I showered very quickly and tried to get some rest, but was only able to sleep like 45 minutes. 

The pass off from Lynell.  We were the Sole Sisters.  

There I go!

The ladies in my van were so nice!  They always asked how I felt and tried to help me any way they could.  

We all met up at the end to run through the finish line together in our matchy shirts.  

 The whole Sole Sisters team

Ragnar may have been a once in a lifetime experience for me.  A team full of my close family and friends could possibly make me do it again.  I'll need a little more time to forget, though.  

Graham Jason

Oh, how I love my sweet boy, Graham.  This kid keeps me smiling (even if sometimes I have to hide it so he doesn't see).  There are so many things I want to remember about him at this age.  

• Favorite foods:  I just asked him and he said, "CHICKEN!"  We bought a rotisserie chicken at Sam's Club for dinner and he chowed down.  He just came to the computer and told me to make sure I say chicken WINGS.  He loves "pizza from the store".  He has to be specify because we make a lot of homemade pizza around here.  He loves brownies and our oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  
• Favorite shows:  Sonic, Super Mario Bros. and Super Hero Squad.  I love Netflix!
• What he wants to be when he grows up:  Ninja (He has told me this many times the last few months.  
• Graham is still as emotional as he's always been.  It seems like I say something like that with every update.  He's all up or all down.  It's still pretty easy to pull him out of a "down", though.   

• Graham LOVES the park.  He asks every single day if we can go.  If it's not going to happen, he's VERY sad and frustrated.  It's the park that is in our little neighborhood.  The reason he loves it so much is because it means he gets to play with his best friend, Junior.  We have Junior over to our house and Graham plays at his house, too, but he likes it best when they get to start their time together with an hour or two at the park.  They usually play Sonic or Ninjas.  They love to race around the circle on their bikes. 

Junior and Graham

• Every Thursday in his kindergarten class, they have what they call "centers".  His teacher, Mrs. Estrada, loves it when parents come to help and I try to go when I can.  My favorite thing about volunteering in Graham's class is that one or two times during centers, he'll call out to me and when he gets my attention, he'll smile and say, "I love you."  It's the sweetest thing and I love that he does it out loud in front of his class.  I can tell he's happy I'm there and that makes me happy.  I know that won't last forever.   
• In January Graham started wrestling.  He's not a fan.  He claims, "It hurts" and never wants to go.  Jason has been helping coach a little bit.  So, now we have the dilemma of deciding if we let him stop going or keep at it.  Wrestling is tough, because at his age there's not really a seasonthat ends anytime soon.  We'll see.  
• Graham continues to be quite the showman when he gets a crowd laughing.  We were eating dinner at a friend's house one evening and all the kids in the other room were laughing.  We asked them about it later and it turns out that Graham was showing off his skills by burping "I love you" over and over again.  That's my boy!
• Graham is very social and out going.  With that, he's also pretty blunt and tell things like it is.  He has no problem letting anyone know if they are bothering him or if he disagrees with something that was said or went down.  We struggle with knowing how to ride the line between respecting adults and sticking up for yourself.  This little man is teaching me to not worry so much about what others think and not to take his misbehavior or acting out moments personally.  
• Graham gave a talk in primary a couple weeks ago.  He told me he wanted to do the "testimony part" at the end by himself.  I backed away from him and he said the sweetest words.  I told him later that day how proud I was of him and he said, "Well, I just really think those words I said."  
• One of his favorite things to do right now is ride his bike to school.  I follow him in the van.  I LOVE seeing him look back at me and speed up to show me how quick he is.  When I go to the "pick-up" spot after school, he always has his helmet on and he rides up next to the car and always asks, "Can we go to the park?"  
• Something I hear at least 5 times a day, "YOU'RE SO MEAN!"  
• We're going through a fibbing phase right now.  It feels like I'm constantly getting on this kid and I have to make a real effort to back off and choose my battles.  The great part is that he's a terrible fibber and he puts on a little annoyed face when I catch him in it, but he also seems a bit relieved.  It's never about anything big......usually just whether or not he washed his hands after going to the bathroom or if he actually really did brush his teeth.  
• I love listening to him sound words out and read signs as we are driving in the car.  It makes my heart happy.  
• This boy thrives when we make special effort to give him one-on-one time.  I know that would be true with all kids, but it seems to especially help my sweet boy.  Whenever we are having a rough few days (lots of arguing), if Jason and I will just set aside a little outing with just him and carve out a few more minutes at bedtime for just him....it turns him around.  I love our time together, too.  A sweeter side of both of us comes out.  I hope that it's during those times that he realizes I'm not just around to nag him and correct his every move, but that I truly enjoy his company and think he's a great kid.  

Graham-bo keeps me questioning my parenting skills and I find myself looking for moments to fine-tune my Love and Logic arsenal, but I am up for the challenge.  I have a special soft spot in my heart for my "not-so-little-anymore" Graham.  He's so sweet, so fun and I feel so blessed to be his mom.  

Benjamin Matthew

Time for a little update on our Benny boy.  He's 3 1/2 years old this month.  He's growing too fast!  I love hearing him talk and talk.  I love his little voice.  The world through his eyes is so funny and so simple.  

I love this picture.  He got invited to Jonah's birthday party and he was so excited to be going alone.  It was a super hero theme.  He LOVES all things superhero.  Here's some more things I want to remember about 3 year old Ben-O.  

• He doesn't quite understand how to use the phrase, "I promise".  He'll say something like, "Mom, can I have another string cheese?"  I'll tell him no and then he'll say, "Pleeeeeaaaaaase!  I promise!"  
• Benny is still our early riser.  He has been since he was tiny.  He's usually up by 6:00-6:30.  I'll hear his door open, followed by his little footsteps coming down the hall.  He walks over to the bed and says in his tired voice, "Can I watch sometheen?" or "Can I have breakduss?"  I've gotten into the bad habit of letting him watch a show on Netflix before I get up and face the day.  
• Speaking of shows.  Some of his favorites:  Sonic, Super Hero Squad, Power Rangers, Super Mario Bros.  During the day he talks about them and shows me their moves.  
• Just now he came up to me with one of his Ninja toys and said, "I'm just a Ninja."  I asked what a ninja does and he said, "They do backfwips in the yair and acshuawy (actually) they do backfwips in the sky."  Benny is always doing jumps and somersaults complete with sound effects and arm moves.  
• Benny loves the color green.  He points it out everywhere we go.  I love that he points out all of our favorite colors, too.  Trees, cars, store signs.  
• Whenever Jason tells Ben no to something, Ben will say, "Mom says no?"  If it's me that told him no, he'll say, "Daddy says no?"  It's nice because he automatically give you an out :) 
• Benny has to have a couple little "guys" in his hands everywhere we go.  They are usually a Power Ranger and one of his Imaginext people.  Sometimes it's one of his Lego Super Mario guys.  He most especially has to have them when we go to the gym or store.  
• We go to the gym most mornings and without fail, every time I pick him up from the childcare center, he says, "Can I have a granola bar when I get home?"  It's just part of the routine.  I recently started a new system where the kids have to have a fruit or veggie before a treat (granola bar, goldfish, PB crackers).  Benny was not a happy camper when I started telling him he had to have a cutie or some carrots before his granola bar.  He has adjusted, though.  
• Instead of asking, "What did you say?"  when he doesn't hear me, he says, "What you said?"  It makes me laugh every time.  
• Instead of "there" or "here", he says, "theren" or "heren".  I wasn't sure how to spell it.  They sound like he's saying it the right way, just with an N sound at the end.  
• Naps ended about 6 months ago for Ben.  He still gets super tired, but if he takes a nap, he has a really hard time going to bed at a reasonable hour.  So, on the days that he has crashed in the car at 4:30 pm or sat still on the couch for too long in the late afternoon, bedtime is a little hairy.  He comes out of his room multiple times and says, "Will you sweep wiff me?" Even when I'm super tired from a long day and I'm done with being mom for a while, those words always make me smile.  I usually tell him no, and he says, "Will you sing me a song?"  So, we go sing a couple songs and hope for the best.  (Sometimes I say yes and lay down with him for a while.  I get to hear more of his sound effects as he lays next to me playing with his little Batman or Power Ranger.)

We love our sweet Ben-O.