This is Abe. I am sitting on my porch at 8:40 PM, blogging next to Lily who is reading a book about Adam and Eve. It is 68 degrees. No wind. Dusk. No bugs. I. Love. Summer. in. Utah.
We had a very good week this week. I had a personal breakthrough in letting go of a lot of my personal goals and routines. I know that sounds like I’m settling and not trying to achieve as much. It sounds like that, because it is that 🙂 Ha. But I’ve found myself able to be way more flexible and happy in each moment, and it turns out flexibility matters when you have four kids 🙂 This week had a lot of awesome moments that I’m so glad I was able to be mindful for rather than being stressed out at each moment that my agenda, vision and goals for the day were not getting executed. Tuesday-Thursday was a work trip for me in Ohio. The meetings went well. I always miss Lily and the family when I’m gone, and I’m always so grateful to return home safe and sound. Things went well for Lily at home. One of her recent secrets has been cooking all the food for the week on Saturday. That definitely helped her week to go more smoothly. She also had a play-date with Heather on Wednesday which she loved. Mary helped Lily make rolls for the playdate (pics below) and also Ammon had fun playing dress-up right before the play-date.
Now for the rundown of Friday through Sunday:
Lily came to Qualtrics with the kids on Friday. It was fun to see them!
When I got home from work on Friday, we did our normal evening routine, after which I took Ammon to the emergency to get his staples removed from his head. Lydia and Mary came for moral support for Ammon and they were darling. They had me assure them that they could close their eyes while the doctor took the staples out. I assured them.
Ammon fussed a little. It hurt more than getting them in, but he did just fine.
Saturday was a mammoth day, but a very very good one. In the morning I exercised and then the whole family went on a run together. We went to a church parking lot. Lily and I jogged and walked, Lydia rode her bikes and Mary and Ammon were in the buddy bubble. In the church parking lot, I raced Lydia on her bike. It was so fun to “compete” with her, and “trash talk” to her (“you can never beat me!!”) only to see her going faster and faster on her bike. My, how she has taken off after just learning a week ago!
At home, I couldn’t resist myself, and I made a tuna sandwich and lemonade setup for everyone to refresh ourselves after the outing. It was only 10:30, not even close to time for lunch, but I hadn’t eaten breakfast and want to have an outside brunch with the kids 🙂 Pics below:
The morning also involved helping my neighbor to shovel rocks into wheel-barrels for his landscaping. That ended when another neighbor asked me to help move a pool table. I couldn’t believe how heavy it was, and even though we left a ton of marks (and a hole) in their wall, I’m just glad nobody got injured. I’ve been studying a lot about service lately and losing our lives in the service of God to truly find our own happiness. To me it is not a coincidence that I had opportunities to serve on the very week that I was pondering about serving others.
After all the activities in the morning, Lily and I did some housecleaning. Then I took the youngest 3 kids to get groceries (thanks to Lily’s list!) and Lily took Lydia to her harp festival.Â
I’m not exactly sure what the event was, but Lydia competed against others at her level or age and come home with “superior” which is the highest mark you can get. This made me extremely pleased, especially because I have a sense for all the long hard painful hours Lily and Lydia have put into practicing. Lily was also so pleased that she bought Lydia a necklace at the festival. Lydia broke it as soon as she got home, and completely melted into a puddle. One thing about Lydia is that the moment something is not how she thinks she needs it to be, she completely falls apart, starts balling, and throwing a giant fit, often with her back flat on the ground.
“Now I’ll never have a necklace!”
“It’s impossible to fix!”
“I need a chain that looks just like this one!”
And my personal [least] favorite:
“Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaeeeeaaaaa!!!” (at the top of her voice which can be extremely loud and blaring).
I was not feeling patient in the moment, and I looked Lydia in the eye and said, “Lydia, I’m sorry your necklace broke, we will do everything we can to make it right. Right now I’m dealing with two real babies, Ammon, and Clarissa. They are both crying too. Stop acting like you are also a baby. Pull yourself together, or I will throw what’s left of your necklace in the trash.”
Maybe not my finest parenting moment. Or maybe it was? That garbage behavior is not acceptable to me. When to use tender love and when to use firmness…..? Ahh, parenting is so confusing. I was glad Lily showed more empathy than I did. It’s so awesome to parent in a group, so that we can round out each other’s parenting. I’d say the “mean cop” is just the parent that has recently spent the most time with the kids respective to the one specific moment in question :). Who is most worn out? Yeah, that parent will be the one being firm/harsh. The other “fresher” parent has the energy to swoop in with tenderness. At least that’s how it seems to work in my house :).
Anyway, later in the evening I fixed her necklace and told her, so it all worked out. Sunday she broke her necklace again, and I celebrated her for not throwing a fit or even feeling sad or crying. Not even a little! After I congratulated her, she said, “Dad, I’m not sad because I know you can fix it now.” Hahaha, parenting sure can be charming at times.
After a delicious salmon dinner (which Chris, our yard-keeper joined us for, to our great delight), Lily and I stayed up late getting her cooking done for the week.
Sunday was an awesome day and way more low-key than yesterday. I especially needed a break after how physical Saturday was. At 10:00 I went up stairs to shower and get ready for work, and then woke up 20 minutes later, since all I actually did was collapse on the bed. Then Lily gave me a back massage which was amazing after all the manual labor yesterday. I then took the kids while Lily napped and read her book about Adam and Eve called The First Love Story, Adam, Eve, and Us by Bruce Feiler. Church was nuts. Ammon is in a completely nutty stage right now. Think of a normal two year old boy (already crazy) and then think of giving that boy caffeine pills. That is what Ammon has been likely lately. He talks, moves, runs, sings, skips, jumps, spins in circles, crawls, climbs, jumps again, gives kisses, falls, gets back up, talks more. and that might all be in a few minutes. Ha, he is so hard to keep up with. Lily and I took turns in sacrament being with him outside because he was so hyper. Then Clarissa woke up in her car-seat right after sacrament, so I took her home and did the budget while she crawled around. I was to tired from yesterday (and fasting) and didn’t feel like I could handle her at church. Clarissa is also in an amazing stage. Her crawling is getting faster! She’s now more like a puppy than the snail she was 2-3 weeks ago. And she is dazzled by all the drawers, the pantry, the open dishwasher, the pan drawer under the oven, the hutch. She was in an incredible mood all day as she explored this new world that has opened to her now that she is so mobile and even standing. That’s right, standing! I caught her yesterday and today getting to a standing position by herself and holding herself there so she could have a better reach into all the treasures in the dishwasher.
Dinner was a wonderful pizza meal outside, and now, as I mentioned in the beginning, Lily and I are chilling in the porch. It was a wonderful, wonderful week.