Ollie's Quiet Time

Yesterday I put both of the boys in their rooms for nap/quiet time. Brian was at class. I started in on the dishes. As I was just washing away in a quiet house, I all of a sudden heard, "T, t," the sounds of Starfall.com floating down over the loft. Ollie had come out of his room, climbed up into the computer chair, double clicked on the internet icon, clicked on the Starfall icon on the favorites bar, and started playing Starfall all by himself!! He is just getting so big all of a sudden. I only heard him do about one letter and then it was quiet again. After a couple of minutes, there was a break in the show that I was watching where I could hear a deep breathing coming from upstairs. I thought to myself, "did he fall asleep playing Starfall that fast?" And sure enough, he had. He was snoozing away in the comfy chair. After Dexy woke up, he wanted to go upstairs to play so I let him thinking that if Ollie woke up it would be ok, but Ollie kept sleeping for another 5 or 10 minutes, until Dexy and I were loudly playing blocks and Brian was on the computer. He must have needed the extra sleep that day!

Fun With Family

Life has returned to normal, or at least to where it was before all the madness. I have restored our computer and nothing was lost (so glad I made the back up discs as soon as I noticed it was struggling). Brian still has a mound of homework everyday, but we're both getting use to what that means. Oliver is sleeping sooooo much better. I have adjusted his schedule. First, he was still just all messed up from the holidays, so we finally got bedtime back to about 8:30 where it should be. Second, I have started more closely monitering his "quiet time." He goes into his room to play quietly and rest. After an hour, I go in to check on him. If he's still awake then his quiet time can be done because he must not need the extra sleep that day. If he's asleep, I leave him, but make sure that he doesn't sleep for more than an hour and a half, waking him up if necessary. He is sometimes pretty unhappy with me for waking him up, but it's much better in the long run. We also had to just divide the boys. Ollie is still in the upstairs room, but we offically moved Dexy to the room downstairs. I cleaned it up a lot (it's still very full of stuff, but at least he won't feel as crowded) and we moved his crib in there. Both boys have been sleeping much better and are much happier about their new sleeping arrangments. So, we got back to trying to relax and enjoy life. It was easy to do when we had some chances to play with family. On the 4th, my grandparents and Mom invited my family and Derek's family over to their place for a most delicious dinner. It was so yummy! The kids all love playing at Grandma 2's house. After dinner, we went downstairs to play a little bit more before heading home and it got wild.
Derek and Brian helped the boys get into an all out bean bag battle. They all loved every minute of it. Bean bags were flying everywhere and boys were laugh histerically. It was so fun!

Then, the very next morning the boys got to wake up to Brian's family. They stopped here for a couple of days on their way to Disneyland (I know - we didn't get to go:( but it was fun to see them and the boys probably aren't quite old enough anyway). Every time we see them, Grandma Bowles has a whole bag of poppers for them. They love them and want to do them every second that they're here. The started with the poppers as soon as they woke up. They couldn't even wait to get dressed. They threw poppers several times through out the day.

We went to Chuck A'Rama for dinner. Ollie wanted to go in the "sabbudon" so we moved his seat and Angela rode with us. The whole way to the resturant and the whole way back home, Dexy had to hold Angela's hand. If she put her hand down, he'd hold his hand out and say, "ha!" (his word for hand) to get her to hold his hand again. And on the way home he fell asleep while holding hands. It was so precious!

And then of course, to finish off the day of fun with Brian's fam, they had to convince Grandma to let them throw the last 2 boxes of poppers, even though it was dark. That actually made it pretty spectacular though, because we could see them spark when they hit the ground. It's always so nice to play with family!

Easier Said Than Done!

It's been a while since my last post. I tried to give myself a new, energizing, hopeful mantra when I last spoke with myself, but like most things, it was far easier to tell myself that than it has been to actually put it into everyday practice. Since then, my computer picked up a virus; I almost lost my 240 page digital photo book again (lost it last time my computer crashed and had to do the whole thing over - almost ripped all my hair out at the thought of having to do it a third time, but fortunately I uploaded and ordered it just in time; the silver lining to all this); my computer crashed; I have backup discs, but they aren't being so cooperative; my boys seem to be usually fighting, screaming, whining, crying, toy snatching, etc; Ollie is still having sleep issues, so much in fact that about a week ago we removed Dexy from their room to a playpen in the then completely full junk room at 5 am, at which point Oliver proceeded to scream for an hour and a half; he did the same thing the following two nights, although he is getting better now; I've had to clean out at least part of the junk room so that Dexy had a place to sleep without feeling like the room was going to collapse on him; Brian is always at school, doing homework, at scouts, playing men's basketball, etc. as he gets into his upper level classes and does all of the duties for his calling; the house seems to be in a continual state of upheaval; there has been a unending flow of urine and blood (no worries - just potty training and lots of minor toddler injuries); and now it's February and it's my month to do sharing time and I am not even prepared and it's Thursday!!!!!!! I know that this is all just one long, exhausting, whiney sentence, but that's the way things have been going around here lately. And I have no pictures because I'm still trying to get our computer up and working and it's not currently reading the SD card from our camera. So now I must reiterate to myself, more forcefully this time - IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE PERFECT!! RELAX AND ENJOY THE RIDE AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE! JUST CHILL OUT!! Maybe I should look into finding some diazepam. OK, or maybe I should just go lay on my bed and stare blankly at the ceiling for 5 minutes before it's time for the boys to get up from their naps. Sorry you all had to deal with this, but I feel better now that I've let all of this out!

Everything Can't, And Shouldn't, Be Perfect

Yesterday we had a fabulous day! That statement might make the title seem confusing, but I'll explain. This is mostly a memo to myself. I hope that others may gleen some wisdom out of it, but if not, at least I will have this thought preserved when I need a reminder later. You see, I often get caught up in needing to do everything perfectly and that's just never going to happen. Got that me - you are NOT EVER going to be 100% in this life and that's OK. Let the unimportant things go and focus on the moments in life that matter. And now, I'll explain.

My boys have been driving each other, and therefore me, crazy lately. I finally realized what I already knew (or maybe I just decided that I it was worth it to put the effort into it) - my boys are getting older and need more engagement in their day. So yesterday morning, we got up and started our day with beautiful music and coloring and cutting. Then we got dressed and in our stroller and headed to the park. We played at the park for a good long time, came home, actually ate a good lunch (they usually just don't eat very much at lunch) while I let them watch only one episode of Dora. Then it was nap time and they went to sleep quietly and quickly. After naps, they got up and we went outside again on a meadering walk to get our mail. We were outside walking for another good chunk of time when my mom called me to find us so she could show us her new-to-her (used) car. It's beautiful, by the way. We went for a ride. The boys really like go for rides with Grammy and it was even more exciting that it was a new car.

When we got back from our ride to Target, Derek's family was over for our fun celebration of Edger Allen Poe's birthday. In our toddler approved attempt at the macabre, we watched the movie Coraline and made dirt cups. The boys helped pound the chocolate grahams into crumbs while Cristina and I made the pudding. Then we got to dig into the mess.

Mud (pudding), dirt (chocolate Goldfish), and worms - not super macabre, but toddler appropriate, at least on the right lines, and yummy!

Ollie actually ate a couple of his super sour worms. I was so impressed!

Jude was all about the pudding!! So much so that he kept taking everyone's spoons in an attempt to get more pudding in every bite!

It took Dexy a while to warm up to any of it, but once he realized that it was delicious food, he dove in. We all had a fun time just watching the movie, chatting, and seeing the kids enjoy their deliciously messy treat. After everyone went home, I got the boys wiped down and into jammies, read a few stories, said prayers and they went to bed without a fuss. And that's a lot at this point. My boys have always been really good about bedtime, but recently Ollie has been unable to wind down, stop talking or screaming, and actually fall asleep until about 10:45! That's crazy late! It was a big part of my "hammer to the head" moment telling me that it was time to do something different. But last night, they was hardly a peep out of them after I shut their door. Then I went downstairs and my house looked like this.......

......toys were scattered everyone from playing with their cousin and having such a grand time.

And the kitchen was a mess from having people over for pizza and a fun, messy treat.

Then I looked down and my shirt looked like this. Now, this picture does not do it justice. It was covered in chocolate pudding splatters, dirt from the park, snotty nose spots, you name it. At that instant I thought to myself, "Wow! Disgusting! Everything is a filthy mess." And then in the very next moment, I had another "hammer to the head" moment where I realized that this was not the shirt of a filthy, disgusting housewife. No, no. This was the shirt of a good mom whose toddlers had had an engaging, active, fabulous day! And then I realized, everything can't be perfect. Nor should it be. If my house and shirt were spotless, then my kids would probably have had a much less fulfilling and stimulating day. And I choose my kids! Then I wore my dirty shirt proudly as I cleaned up the toys and did the sink full of dishes. And you know what, it didn't take all that long to clean up the mess, especially with my sweet husband's help, and the great day that we had had, will last much longer!

These are the moments that really matter! Remember me - focus in on what's really important, let some stuff go, and just try to enjoy the ride!

Blue Skies

The weather was beautiful on Monday. The sky was blue and the sun was out and eventhough it's January, it wasn't even that cold. It was also a holiday, so Brian and Derek didn't have class. We therefore decided to get together. We put our boys tricycles in our trunk and headed over to Derek and Cristina's apartment out in Ivins. After Alice had been fed and could be left happily with the daddies, Cristina and I took the boys out to the parking lot behind their building to ride their trikes. We had a grand old time! They rode and pushed their trikes and filled their baskets full of rocks, played peek-a-boo from the garbage area (lovely, I know), found ledges for jumping off, and chased after balls. We were all so happy at that moment (as well as just in general) to be living in St. George where we could go outside in January to find not only no snow, but blue skies, only cool weather, and a lovely day!!

Being a Boy is in the DNA

Marie and her boys came down to St. George and stayed with us for a couple of days. They left this afternoon. We had tons of fun playing with 4 of our fun boy cousins! We went out to say goodbye as they drove away and Ollie and Dexy of course found their way into the dirtiest spot in front of our house.
Not only are the sitting on the black, but in one of the few remaining patches of disgusting parking lot snow, and right up by the curb where it's most filthy! The best part? Shortly after snapping these pictures they started EATING the disgusting parking lot snow!! I certainly didn't give them this kind of idea. It just comes in boy DNA!

New Year's Day

OK, so here is what we did for our New Year's Day festivites. We went to a big snowy hill and strapped our feet into death traps!

Just kidding! They weren't death traps, but I did fall......a lot..........a really lot. Ben's family has snowboards and these little skiis, so he and Amanda had a great idea to take us up the Salt Lake Canyon to try them out. Since the boys didn't really love it when we tried sledding, we left them at home with Grandma to eat lunch and take a nap while we hit the slopes. Only Ben has ever done any of this stuff before.

That became very obvious as the rest of us fell all over the place and he glided down the hill with grace.

I tried the skiis first and didn't do too, bad. Then I took a shot on one of the snowboards and fell so many times it wasn't funny. But, when I did stay up on it, the board went way fast, which was a fun ride. For a few seconds anyway. Brian stuck to the snowboard. Amanda and Angela stuck to the skiis. Ben did a little of both, too. And it wasn't even as cold as we thought it would be. It was a fun, adventurous, active way to kick off the New Year!