The Simmons and a prayer

We got to church over an hour late today…oops! Guess we stayed up too late last night.

During Sacrament meeting, Mary lay on the floor and cuddled Chester, a service dog. (His owner is our friend and gave us explicit, unsolicited permission.) Lydia, who is scared of dogs, interrupted the whole meeting by crying in a loud, terrified voice," Daddy!! Get May-wee! Chester is going to eat her!!"
During Sacrament meeting, Mary lay on the floor and cuddled Chester, a service dog. (His owner is our friend and gave us explicit, unsolicited permission.) Lydia, who is scared of dogs, interrupted the whole meeting by crying in a loud, terrified voice,” Daddy!! Get May-wee! Chester is going to eat her!!”

In other news, we caught up on sleep all afternoon, and then I cooked for the rest of the day. We had Balu, Fallon, Morgan, Audrey and Eli over for dinner. I made stuffed pumpkins again ($1 pumpkins at Sprouts right now!) and followed through with the actual kale-garlic mashed potatoes recipe that I didn’t quite finish last week. Last night I dried out spelt bread for the pumpkins. I think this time was the best go of the pumpkins yet; the quality of the bread makes SUCH a difference! In my ideal world, the next time I’d try this would be with brioche or challah…but let’s be serious. That type of bread wouldn’t last long enough to go stale in my house, so spelt might be as good as it gets.

Audrey and Lydia and Mary spent the evening running around the house playing with each other. It was so cute to see how Audrey and Lydia included Mary in their play and even became distressed when Mary would wander back to the grown-ups. Meanwhile, the grown-ups were going ga-ga over 23 pound, one-year old Eli (his 3 year old sister, Audrey, weighs a mere three pounds more than he). He kept flashing the table these adorable, mile-wide grins that melted us right down through the floor.

Balu was a great sport and endured another dinner conversation about parenting, Provo and potty-training, and he remained jovial through it all. We love him.

At bedtime, Lydia said the most beautiful prayer of her life. I have Balu, my mom, and Abe to corroborate what I’m recording, and I hope if I get any of it wrong or leave out parts, they’ll help me amend this post later. We did not help Lydia at all–this is just what was in her heart tonight.

“Fank-you (“thank-you”) that Balu and Nana could come over. Fank-you that Daddy could get a new job. Fank-you that May-wee and me can get a good sweep (sleep). Fank-you for Marian (Anderson, the African American opera singer from the 30’s). Fank-you for my new books. Fank-you that we can sleep in late. Fank-you for all of my bwessings (blessings). In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.”

I’m sure I’m leaving parts out because it was quite a long prayer, but that’s what I remember. At the end we were all so grateful for our sweet, grateful little girl.

Here are today’s pictures:

IMG_5906

After Mary's nap, we neglected to go to her right away. We then found Lydia by Mary's Pack 'n Play saying, "Ma-wee, are you awake sweet baby? Do you want to get out of your cwib?" It was very touching.
After Mary’s nap, we neglected to go to her right away. We then found Lydia by Mary’s Pack ‘n Play saying, “May-wee, are you awake sweet baby? Do you want to get out of your cwib?” It was very touching.