My Babies

I don't want to forget all of the sweet moments and feelings I have about my kids at their young ages. I try to write things down and take pictures and movies. But it's obviously impossible to immortalize every moment. So I'm learning to find joy in the moments each day. It's so satisfying to live in the moment and soak up the goodness of their pure little souls. I love being a mom.

Tyson is 17 months old now. One of my favorite things he says is "umm" for yummy when he's enjoying his food. This morning he came walking across the kitchen with a big chunk of corned beef he found on the floor from last night's dinner. He was sucking on it and saying "umm." Yucky but darling. :) Our biggest concern for him right now is his walking. He's been walking for a little over 3 months now. And since he started, he's been turning his right foot outward with every step. It is sometimes more pronounced than other times. A few weeks ago, he was limping for about two days. I took him to the clinic while he was limping and the pediatrician wrote a referral for him to see a pediatric orthopedist at Shriner's in Spokane. They still haven't called to make the appointment. I took him to see Ken Jones, a physical therapist, who doesn't usually see kids under 8 at his practice. He did lots of range of motion with his hips and everything looks normal. He did find that Tyson's right foot is slightly longer than his left. So that could be why he is walking with his right foot out, to compensate for the height difference. I hope we can get him to see the specialist soon.
Tyson is becoming more squirrely at church and basically anywhere that we try to contain him (shopping carts, library story time). He will sit quite contently in the big shopping carts where he can sit forward facing. We went to the Oregon Coast and had a 6.5 hour drive. He did amazingly on the way there. The trip home wasn't as good. And he was happy and slept great while we were there. The funniest thing he did there was whenever he got ahold of a ping pong paddle he would walk around like a sumo wrestler, legs wide and stomping, and say in a deep voice "uhh! uhh!" He is a funny little guy. We just adore him. He loves anything with a handle- play sword, light saber, nerf gun, tools, suit case, tennis racket, wooden spoon. He weighed around 21 pounds when I took him to get his leg checked out (close to 17 months old). He still doesn't like Papi and will sometimes tolerate Keenan holding him. He's actually pretty skittish around most people other than his immediate family. He does love to facetime anyone. And he's usually fine with Abby holding him. We finally dropped his morning nap at 16.5 months. It was a struggle for a week to adjust to that. But it's so much better now! He was waking up around 6:30 and taking two 1-1.5 hour naps. He still goes to bed around the same time, 6:30. But he sleeps in until 7:30 and has recently been taking a few 3 hour naps in the afternoon. It's so nice to have the mornings to run errands and play with friends now. Tyson loves to be outside. He actually plays pretty well independently outside. We still have to keep an eye on him. But he lets us work in the yard while he plays nearby. He likes going for walks and I love our jogging stroller. I felt silly buying it a few months ago, not knowing if we'll even have another baby. But I'm glad I did. It makes walks smoother on our bumpy road and I love not pushing a bulky double stroller around.

Esther has become quite an interesting little girl. Every night I tell the girls two stories. Annika always chooses a story from my childhood. Ester used to. But she's bored with those I guess. For the last few weeks, she's been saying things like "tell me a story about when you were in a forest and a bear was on fire and you died' or "when the bad guys killed you." Last night her request was so gruesome that I refused to embellish on it. I can't remember what it was now. Her dark side is a little scary. Also funny. Another night she said "tell me a story about when you were by the ditch but there was no water. It was on fire and the car fell on top of you and you died." I told her I would only tell nice stories. So her new request was "you falled down and get owies on your head and you can't make it stop bleeding and you have to go to the hospital."Also a few weeks ago, David walked into the kitchen at 9:30 and found her watching Netflix on mute! This girl is something else. We found her watching Netflix another night that same week. Two nights ago, I heard her telling stories to herself. I heard words like "bug spray, bear spray, bear shoot guns." :) She always gives me a big hug after I tell her a story at night. And a few times after the hug she says "mom, I really like you." :) She is as sweet as she is sassy, and I'm pretty sure we've been saying that since she was one.

Benson did awesome in the district preschool this year! He had excellent behavior, learned the alphabet, sight words, and more, and he was happy every day when he came home. He brought his teacher several gifts throughout the year. He is such a thoughtful boy. He brought her pictures he colored, a story he wrote, candy from his stash, and some of our junk mail (that was my favorite:)). His teacher sent me this text at the end of the school year: "You have such an amazing little boy and he has such a good attitude about everything. I put his story he wrote on the wall and also shared it with the class. He was very excited. His teacher next year is going to adore him. And if he/she doesn't it's them not Benson. He got a special prize (hot wheels car) from the secretary on Friday. I had to choose one boy and one girl who I felt was a great example and respectful to others in class and to teachers. It didn't take me even 2 seconds to come up with his name and another child's." We're still working on working through anger feelings at home. But he has grown and improved so much in the emotional arena. I'm really proud of my Benson boy. He says some pretty funny things. The other day he asked me "do I have to have a wife?" I told him no. He said he "(doesn't) want to have a wife so then he can just relax and not have to do things for a wife and kids. And I can make breakfast and have what I want." He also said he wants to live on the Oregon Coast and be a mountain climber who collects rocks. I guess he's got things figured out. Physical affection is definitely one of his big love languages. He's always up for a big hug. He loves to hold Tyson. That's getting harder and harder with that active baby.

Annika planned a Family Home Evening activity all on her own tonight. I actually forgot it was Monday night. She just came downstairs, where the rest of us were playing, and said "I have a lesson ready for us." This girl blows my mind with how responsible and thoughtful she is. She used an idea from the back of a Curious George book. She got an egg carton, a container of dirt, seeds, and saran wrap. We talked about faith and planted pumpkin seeds in the carton. It was a perfect and meaningful lesson. She checked out a book from the library a few weeks ago called "Kid-sized Devotions" based on the Bible. She read all 365 pages in a few days. I'm impressed with her choice of reading material and attention span. She sits and reads for an hour quite often. She also is loving the piano. She told me today "I love the piano. It's my favorite instrument." She spends at least 30 minutes practicing her songs most days. She plays for 2-15 minutes at a time several times a day. It makes me so happy to see her enjoying playing piano so much. Her favorite songs to play are the simplified primary songs. She played Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam in primary a few weeks ago. She isn't an extrovert in public. So I'm always impressed and a little surprised when she gets up in front of people. She also bore her testimony for the first time last fast Sunday. She said "I know this church is true. I know Joseph Smith was a true prophet. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen." I am not a great gospel scholar. But I do bear simple testimony to my children often and I hope that the goodness we are cultivating in our home will be the beginning of a lifelong pursuit of gospel study and living for all of them. A month ago, Annika was talking about her golden birthday (31). I told her she might have 4 kids then (like me). She said "I hope not. That'd be a lot of work. I hope I only have 3 kids. Three's enough. Actually maybe one. One or three, it doesn't matter." I told her yes it is a lot of work but I also get to have a lot of fun with my kids. She said she'd rather go to work. I told her that was fine. But that I like being home and it'd be hard for me to take my kids to daycare. She said she'd just work in the mornings at farmers market. And then she said "the highest number I want is 6. If I get more than 6 kids I won't be happy. If I only had one I wouldn't get very many grandkids." I love having conversations like this with my kids. :) Annika has also been doing a lot of crafting, inventing, and math. The first day of summer break, she was at the kitchen table making crafts almost all day. I think her need to create hadn't been fulfilled in awhile. It was fun to watch her creating all day. Today, she made parachute airplanes for a few hours. And she has a notebook that she's been working through math problems that she writes out for herself. I can't wait to see what she does with her life. I love watching my kids explore and discover.