Dang it, I'm a horrible mother...

And I just can't resist sharing pictures of my kids when they're sleeping... that's when they're most adorable anyway.

So, the boys fell asleep right next to the front door... without me... and yes, they were crying at the time.

What was I doing, you ask? I was chatting online with my sisters...

Oh... and I was also nursing C down for a nap. Here's the proof of that...

Go ahead and judge me.

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On another note, I've been forgetting to put fun pictures up. So here's a fun collection of recent pics of each of the kids.

Our girls LOVE to play dress-up and pretend. Here, C created her own outfit from everything pink she could find.

K LOVES this Native American costume. I have no idea why, but it's always the first one she puts on.

Sisters (and J2 in the corner).

D, being a dog. K took this picture.

Me & my boys. This picture was actually taken a month or so ago. I just barely figured out how to sling them both... but it's pretty tough, and I don't really have hands free, and there's no way I would attempt to do this outdoors by myself, or leave the house like this. Thank goodness for my giant double stroller, and for Dave.

Brotherly Love

About a week ago I noticed the house seemed a bit quieter than usual. Normally this means someone is doing something they shouldn't... or someone fell asleep. It's interesting that it doesn't matter who is sleeping... if anyone is unconscious, the house feels quieter.

More often than not, the quiet is the result of a big mess somewhere, so it's always wise to go investigate. This time, as I got out of my chair, K came running up saying, "Mom! You've got to come see what I just did!" She led me into her bedroom, to C's bed and showed me this:

She had put J1 on C's bed and explained that she just lay with him and sang to him until he fell asleep. AWESOME. Maybe I should put her in charge of naps from now on.

Which brings us to today. I usually swaddle or super swaddle the boys for their naps. I've been working on putting them down more and more awake and letting them fall asleep on their own. It's been going pretty well, except that the boys have figured out how to roll even while super swaddled, and then they just play instead of sleeping. So I started stuffing pillows around them so they can't roll as easily. I also have to put a pillow between them or they'll roll on top of each other.

Today, I put them down as usual, both fed, both tired, but both awake. Then I left to feed the girls. The boys were a bit fussy and mad that I had left them... but it was the whiny, tired pout, and not a truly upset cry, so I left them. Just as I sat down to eat with the girls, I noticed everything in my room was quiet, so I went to check on the boys again. Turns out, they had wriggled just enough to get their heads together before they were able to fall asleep.

I love that they're both leaning into each other. I'm not sure if this love is *why* they were always facing each other in my belly, or if they love each other like this *because* they were stuck facing each other for so long. Either way... it's a beautiful sight. Even if J1 does like to smoosh his hand in J2's face... I guess J2 doesn't seem to mind.

Spelling Lessons

We often write our to-do list on post-its and stick them onto our white board. The kids can't erase them as easily, and, as you can see, it's more colorful.

Yesterday, K decided (all by herself) to write our to-do list. She happily busied herself with the post-its and a pen. I was quite impressed with the end result. Not only did she remember most of the jobs that needed to be done (now why can't she just DO them?), she also came up with some pretty creative spellings.

I would like to thank PBS Kids and Super Why's Princess Pea (with spelling power!) for teaching K to spell. She's gotten very good at hearing most of the sounds in words and writing them down. She still misses a few... but hey... she's only 4!

Here's a pic of my favorite:

And here's a few more that she came up with (and for some reason she prefers to write in all caps... so I'm not yelling here, just being true to the artist):

CLEN GORBIT KAN

KLER THE TABL

WOSH CULRS

WOSH CIZ CLOS

FLD CIZ CLOS

FLD MOMM AN DADD

CLEN DADD AN MOMM DESK

VAKYOOM MOMMY AN DADDY ROOM

VAKYOOM FAMLY ROOM

PIKUP TOES

PU UW THE TO BUKTS

For those who would like a translation... here's the translated version of her list:

Clean garbage can

Clear the table

Wash Colors (laundry)

Wash Kids Clothes

Fold Kids Clothes

Fold Mom and Dad's (laundry)

Clean Dad and Mom's Desk

Vacuum Mommy and Daddy's Room

Vacuum Family Room

Pick-up Toys

Put away the toy buckets (she got a bit distracted during this last one, and kept forgetting where she was...)

Overall... not bad for a 4 year old.

Surprise, Surprise!

Who says you can't be crazy and spontaneous with lots of kids? Last weekend we did something crazy. Some would call it stupid. We packed up our kids, and our car and drove out of state. We spent a total of 30 hours on the road, so that we could spend 36 hours at our destination...

It was TOTALLY worth it.

A few weeks ago, my brother David (yes there are a lot of David's in my life... just go with it), turned in his mission papers. He then informed me that I would not be able to be with him when he opened his mission call, because he was driving home to surprise my parents so he could open it with them. When I protested, and told him he was being stupid, his response was, "You should come too." I (being equally stupid) said, "maybe we will."

After some negotiating with Dave & some Google maps itineraries & a cost analysis (who in my family can truly be spontaneous after all), we decided to make the drive to Oregon. And we decided we would also surprise my parents.

The drive went surprisingly well. Here's K, with the biggest excitement of the day:

She spent about 20 minutes at one rest stop gathering all the pink rocks. And J1 enjoyed sitting in the front seat, briefly. I needed a place to put him that was out of the wind, and he was sick of the carseat, and he doesn't really sit up yet... so we came up with this:

J2 got to sit in the driver's seat... but I forgot to get a picture of that.

After 15.5 hours on the road we pulled into Hillsboro, OR. We knocked on my parents door at 10:30pm and my brother Michael answered with a "What!?!" He then had my mom walk to the door, and she literally screamed when she saw us. It was priceless, and exactly the reaction we were hoping for. We asked if we could spend the night and she replied, "Only if you brought the kids!" (They were all asleep in the car still.)

David had gotten stuck in some nasty weather that we got through before it got nasty, so he was still several hours behind us, so we had to make up some excuse as to why we randomly showed up. Then I snuck David in around 1am, after everyone was in bed. My dad figured out what was going on, and my parents found David in the loft in the morning.

We had a ton of fun with my family (so much that I completely forgot to pull out my camera and take pictures), and it was great to see everyone again. But Dave and I both felt that the worst part of being in Oregon, was knowing that we couldn't stay. Everything from the green trees (and green grass, and green rocks, and green sidewalks, and even green roads), to the wonderful smell, to the beautiful hills, the beautiful city & towns, and even the slight humidity was breathtaking. We loved every minute we were there, and feel even more sure it is where we want to be when Dave finishes school.

We're now back home, safe and sound, exhausted from another long day of driving, and sad to be away from our beloved Oregon. The countdown to Dave's graduation is going much slower than I would like...

J1 asleep in the bouncy airplane @ my parents house, fingers & all.

ps. David is going to the El Salvador San Salvador West/Belize Mission. The mission includes Belize & the western portion of El Salvador. He'll be speaking Spanish and he reports to the Provo MTC on June 16th. Yay!!

Just in case you were wondering

Thanks to Sears and our 3 year warranty, our washing machine is again alive & well. This is what 12 loads of washed, dried and unfolded laundry looks like.

This is a pretty typical weeks worth of laundry for us... except that we've been using disposables since the washer broke. Otherwise, we'd have an additional 4 loads of diapers mixed in with this.

My poor boys are already in bed for the night, and barely have room on the far side of the mountain that is our clean laundry.

My Girls Approve

Apparently I've raised them right. I showed my girls the Sport Princess Blog and they got super excited and wanted to see all the pictures. K complained that there weren't enough pictures of the princesses, and she wanted more. I explained that there would be more pictures later, but that wasn't good enough for her. So she went and drew this:

and this...

I'm happy to say that my girls are big sports fans too. They're currently in a gymnastics class, but we'll be doing soccer in the fall & probably t-ball next spring. :)

e.t.a. The girls keep drawing. K wanted me to share this picture too:

And now they're begging me to get out their dress ups so they can dress up as Sport Princesses. D wants to be a baseball Princess, and K wants to be a football Princess. :D

Sport Princess

Now, this is something I can get behind!

As many of you know, I am the sports fan in our family. I am the one who grew up on Cougar football (& the 49ers because my parents lived in the Bay Area for a while, and not just because Steve Young was on the team... that was just a bonus). I am the one who played softball, and watched my sister play soccer for years (somehow I never took up the soccer thing... kind of wish I had).

I'm also the one who insisted on getting season tickets to the BYU games every year we lived in Provo. And once we had 3 kids, I insisted on still taking everyone to at least one home game each year, and I push for cable so we can watch the rest. We also try to attend some soccer games/volleyball games & gymnastics meets with our kids too. (Not sure why, but I don't think we've ever done a basketball game with them... hmm... maybe we should.)

Dave on the other hand... If you remember, when we first met, before we started dating, Dave is the one who took over my shift at work so that I could attend the BYU football games.

So, of course, I was SUPER excited to find this blog and you can bet I'll be entering all contests & such to try to get free books & prizes related to this idea (only because we're still students & completely broke... otherwise, I'd just pay for it). :)

So glad to know there are women out there who understand sports the way I do. :)

Oh yea... and this is, of course, the reason our family picture this year included all of us in BYU sweatshirts, with the Cougar in front of Lavell Edwards Stadium. The only thing that would have been better would be to have a picture from *inside* the stadium. Unfortunately, D fell asleep during the Air Force game this year, and this was the best picture we could get.

And just a few minutes before, here's K, Aunt Lindsay & sleeping D.

Attack of the Machines

So there we were, trying to enjoy a nice Sunday afternoon. Some good family time, mixed with a generous helping of Vancouver Winter Olympics. It was during this semi-peaceful time that we first heard the noise... like something had been unleashed not far from where we sat... the sound of something horrible rolling its horrible eyes, the sound of someone trying to reach a scare quota. Cautiously, we approached the noise and found none of the above. There was no Wild Thing, no Monsters Inc. employee, no... just a washing machine trying to walk away from the wall.

I immediately pulled out all information I had on the washer and called Maytag. After struggling through their automated system, I was informed that I would need to discuss the issue with a customer service representative and I pressed 1 to continue. Then I was informed that all service centers were closed for the weekend.

Monday morning, I called again. This time I struggled through the automated system, finally talked with a human being, and was informed that there was nothing they could do for me since the washer is more than a year old. I did purchase the 3 year protection plan for the washer, but I'll have to take my complaint up with Sears instead of Maytag... of course.

So, I called Sears, struggled through their automated system, and was finally connected with someone who was definitely NOT a native English speaker... after several minutes of repeated questions from both of us, he finally told me that he could not help me, but he would connect me with someone who could. *transfer to a person who IS a native English speaker...but from the South and I still can't understand a word she says* Finally, I had my situation explained, all relevant information given, and the best they could do was send out a service tech on THURSDAY!

(Hmmm... 4 days without laundry... I guess we'll have to stretch everything.) We did our best to stretch the cloth diapers, we aired out blankets & sheets instead of stripping beds like I wanted to, and we rinsed some underwear in the sink...

Thursday finally came. The tech (who came 3 hours later than I hoped) spent 10 minutes looking at the washer. He then called me in to explain that "it broke." Apparently, one of the huge concrete counterweights (the ones that are supposed to prevent the washer from walking during the spin cycle) completely broke... and it fell around the washer drum, landed on the other concrete counterweight and cracked that one. Thank goodness we purchased the extended protection plan... Unfortunately, now we have to wait while UPS ships us 40lbs of concrete. We will hopefully have a tech come install the concrete (which should arrive sometime this week) on Monday the 8th.

Of course... I was already at the end of my towels. There was NO way we could wait another 11 days for the washer to be fixed. So, I packed up my kids, my 11 loads of laundry and headed to the laundromat.

We packed a lunch and the girls' workbooks, and spent the afternoon amongst fabric softener, bleach, and the change machine.

My boys did pretty well, but J2 here got a little upset and needed some comfort while we waited for the last enormous (and insanely expensive) dryer. (I know my dryer at home works perfectly fine... but who wants to haul 11 loads of sopping wet laundry home? And besides, we all know it would never actually make it to my dryer, and would instead start to mold in my living room.) And the sweatshirt is a lovely reminder that it was, in fact, laundry day.

After a second run to the laundromat today, with another 7 loads, I am just extremely grateful that we own our own washer & dryer. I was right to insist on an in-home washer/dryer when we first moved into this basement 5 years ago.