The New Girl

Chloe is officially a big girl now. She had her first day in the nursery at church and LOVED it. As soon as I took her into the nursery room and set her free, she ran for the toys without looking back. When I came to get her after nursery I expected a squeal, a smile, a hug, or something of that nature to show that she missed me but instead I was greated by her outstretched arms with someone elses shoes in each hand. I guess she felt quite "at home" in nursery because that is exactly what she does at home. Her special "Heavenly Father and Jesus Love Me" badge was pinned to her chest and you could tell that she was proud to have been adorned. Her pride at her role as a "big girl" was short-lived since she fell asleep just seconds after being strapped into her car seat. Clancy was so excited to ask her what she learned in nursery and told me later that she will be coming to "Sunbeams" (his nursery class) in a few weeks.

Happy Easter

I just wanted to say Happy Easter...after all I did start this post on Easter...

I love Easter, a celebration of spring and new life. This year what has meant the most to me is that because of Jesus Christ and His miraculous resurrection ALL mankind can live again after we die. What a great promise and what a comforting thought.

I recently watched "My Sister's Keeper" a very sad and touching movie about the family that had a specially genetically selected baby in order to help treat and possibly cure their older daughter's cancer (a true story and available at RedBox). I remember reading about this story in the "Reader's Digest" as a teen-aged snowshack worker and shaking my head at the parents' ethically challenging decision. As I watched the movie I just felt so terribly sad for the family for so many reasons. I don't know if I have ever wept about a movie before...teared up possibly but never wept. Today as I listened to the General Conference talks, and specifically the one about the boy who died right after his brother left to serve his two year mission, those same feelings came back to me. I just can't imagine losing a child or a sibling. I imagine even while knowing that you can see them again it would be terrible and painful for a long long time, but I can't imagine how it would feel to think that you will never see them again. I am so grateful for Jesus Christ and the miracle of resurrection.

The kids enjoyed Easter (mostly the chocolate), egg-hunting, dyeing hard boiled eggs and then breaking them, and having friends to play with at dinner, but I know Clancy learned about resurrection too. I am so glad.








After a little verbal prodding by my mom, I went to Target for an Easter dress for Chloe. We found some cute, inexpensive and brightly colored knit dresses and Chloe was really excited when she saw them. I held them up for her to choose from and she pointed and said "Dat". She probably changed her mind a few times, so I got two for her. When we put them in the cart with her she hugged them and said "Pleeeeeeze?" with her cutest and sweetest persuasive look on her face. I don't know where this girl came from...certainly she's not much like me.

Seeing Colors

Something has got me seeing color...not that I have ever been color-blind or anything. It's just that lately I have really noticed all the beautiful color in the world. Maybe it was those rainbow cupcakes that were pleasing to the eye than they were delicious or maybe it is because spring has sprung (yesterday it was 68 degrees here), or maybe it is because Andrew is finally back to around 45 hours a week instead of double that. Whatever the cause of my new vision, I am grateful for it.

I couldn't, in good conscience, walk around appreciating the impeccably manicured lawns, well-groomed flowerbeds, and perfectly trimmed hedges of my neighbors and return to the long-neglected trees, flowerbeds, and lawn (now several inches tall in patches) without feeling just a smidge hypocritical...so on one beautiful afternoon, I put the kids in their room for a nap and busted out the lawnmower. After edging and mowing, I started weeding, and could have happily worked at it all day...but I thought I heard the laundry monster inside causing a ruckus. Oh well, there will be more beautiful afternoons and more naps (fingers crossed) and more weeding.

In honor of my visual cortex, I am planning to add some life to our bathrooms in the form of some "natural" pictures. Having been inspired by Aimee and Todd (a couple of fantastic photographers and interior designers with side gigs), I have comissioned some original works from Andrew. In addition to hosting Andrew's online gallery, I am selfishly posting these so you can help me choose some pictures to frame and hang. Send in your votes and then come visit us when they are hung!

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...And, just for fun here are the candidates for the other seaside bathroom:

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Weeping and Wailing and Gnashing

Yep, there has been a lot of that lately. Chloe has been getting four molars and some other teeth too, and she has not been too happy about it. I noticed that there was a problem when she stopped eating (she used to out eat Clancy and was much less picky). Then the unstoppable mid-night crying started. We tried every thinkable means to get her calmed down and settled (including the usually magical infant Tylenol) but nothing worked until we all went downstairs to watch an Elmo movie. As soon as the fuzzy red guy appeared, the crying stopped. Andrew and I catnapped through the movie periodically being poked back into awareness by our little daughter who didn't want to be the only one awake. Luckily we haven't had to resort to another midnight showing of Elmo again...yet.
At Stake Conference we decided to sit in one of the smaller side rooms and watch the proceedings on a closed-circuit television rather than take our chances in the enormous main hall. About 5 minutes into the meeting, Clancy decided to explore a bit and while running, tripped over the piano and gnashed his bottom lip. Andrew quickly extricated him blood and all. When he came back I could barely look at his lip, it looked really painful. Though it swelled and he got a fat lip, he also held it out artificially so it looked really swollen and yucky.

That same day we took a picnic lunch to the University of Washington quad where the famous Cherry Blossoms are. We were not alone there, there were hundreds of people vying for an opportunity to snap their photos with the blossoms. Luckily we were able to elbow our way to take ours (just kidding, it wasn't THAT crowded). There were few times during this experience that I saw Chloe crack a smile (teething) and I think most of them were when she was admiring one of the many many purebred dogs that the Seattle populous seems enamored with (I am not sure I saw even one purebred dog growing up, but here it is like the Westminster dog show every time we go outside).

St. Patrick's Day Greetings from the Emerald City by the Sound

This year we celebrated St. Patrick's Day not with corned beef and cabbage, but with rainbows and paper. On Monday night we had a St. Patrick's Day family home evening where we talked about the legend/maybe or maybe not truthful story that St.Patrick used a shamrock to explain the Godhead to a Pagan mob. I have never heard that story, but I think it is interesting...shamrocks have three leaves (or three lobes of one leaf?) united by one stem--just as the Godhead (Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are separate beings but so united in purpose that they are often confused as one being. So in honor of the shamrock we decked out our ceiling (after first cutting down the red, white, and pink hearts that were there).



Clancy saw me preparing the shamrocks before FHE, and of course asked about a bazillion questions about them so when it came time for him to say the opening prayer, he thanked Heavenly Father for the "what kind of rocks are they?" (imagine this question repeated several times until we could figure out that he was asking a question).



This little leprechaun showed up overnight, much to the kids' delight!

This morning when I burst through the door to wish the kids a happy St.Patrick's Day, I was, of course, wearing green and Clancy was wearing green pajamas. Chloe, however, was wearing her obligatory pink pajamas with no green. When I reminded Clancy that Chloe didn't have any green and asked him what we should do, I expected him to volunteer to pinch her. Luckily, he surprised me by saying "we'd better get her into green!". He reminded me to have her wear green in his most frantic animated voice when I started putting on her pink tights (with a green dress to follow of course). He also very thoughtfully included in his breakfast prayer a thanks to Heavenly Father that he can wear a green shirt and a plea that Heavenly Father would bless me that he (Clancy) can't pinch me today (Many Thanks Clancy).






The green eggs and ham and Irish Soda Bread didn't make it to our table this year, we had leftovers instead, but our big splurge was some rainbow cupcakes with a cloud on top. A friend saw this in "Family Fun" magazine and made it for ABC school. I thought they were so neat that I was excited to make them for Activity Days. It was so fun, but I think next time I'll save myself the trouble and make it a cake!

Re-purposed

So we northwesterners like to think that we're ahead of the game in green-ness and as my mom recently discovered, some of the choice has been taken out of our recycling. Our garbage can fits 2-3 tall kitchen bags while the recycling can is probably 1.75 times its size. I must say recycling has become a hobby and a way of life, and when I went on a tour of a preschool and they talked about letting the kids play with recycled materials, the wheels in my head started to turn.

Lately I have begun to re-purpose things instead of recycle them. We've used cardboard TP holders as trumpets, telescopes and all the normal things but lately we've started to branch out.




Clancy and his friend Alan are the happy owners of these rockets, though Clancy's is probably much a NASA rocket, waiting for some interest and a mission. My latest brilliant re-purposing idea struck me when a friend gave me flowers for my birthday and I didn't have an appropriately-sized vase. Do you recognize this container? I'd have to say that noone that saw it could recognize it, and some even complimented me for it.



For all of you with creativity as a talent, pass on some re-purposing ideas before the drawers in the craft room fill with cardboard tubes!