We returned home on Tuesday. The biggest stop en route was in Rexburg. That’s where Clarissa woke up, so we pulled off and tried to stop by the Teton Flood Museum. Elder Eyring mentions the Teton Flood in some of his General Conference talks, and we thought going to the museum would be great. It turns out the museum is closed Tues-Thurs, and it’s only open for a total of 12 hours a week.
Oh, well. It was right by a big lawn, and Abe and the kids had a fantastic time running around while I changed and nursed Clarissa. After we went around the corner to Great Harvest. They sold me a sandwich with rotten avocado. It was disgusting, but by the time we discovered it we were on the highway. I called to let them know the situation so that they didn’t accidentally poison their other patrons.
When we got home, Abe worked like crazy to clean the car. He was so sweet. He knew I didn’t really want to go on the trip, and he made sure that everything wasn’t ruined by the trip. After his work, the laundry was done, the car was clean and vacuumed, and you barely knew we had left on a trip. I would have helped more had Clarissa not been so needy. She was tired of being in her carseat and wanted to be held a lot.
Abe also had the most fun with the girls he has ever had. They played “cat and bird,” where Abe was the cat, Mary was the baby bird, and Lydia was the mama bird. Lydia’s job was to drop basketballs on Abe whenever Abe tried to snatch Mary, her baby bird. Abe was so relaxed from the trip that he was able to really pretend he was a cat, and he has never had so much fun playing with the kids–and he plays with them a lot, so I think that is saying something.
On Monday we left the condo as soon as the kids woke up and hit the grocery store for breakfast. After that, we entered Yellowstone! This is our fourth family trip to Yellowstone, and we have never done the North Loop in previous trips. We fixed that this time.
First we headed to Canyon Village where we got hike suggestions, rented bear spray, procured lunch, and used the restrooms.
Then we drove to Tower Falls for a very short walk to the falls.
Abe loved Clarissa in her bear suit and posed her on this bench. He hid behind her as we tried to get pictures that made it look like there was a pink bear on a log all by herself.
After the falls, we drove to the Lamar Valley and took a lovely short hike in the valley. This was one of the highlights of the trip for me, and it is certainly the place where we took the most pictures. If my groin weren’t still strained, we would have hiked a lot longer. It was just such a wonderful, expansive, soul-liberating setting.
After the Lamar Valley we drove to Mammoth Hot Springs. Our phone died so we did not get any pictures at the springs.
On the way, all of the kids fell asleep, and Lydia woke up very sad from her nap. She sobbed the entire time we walked around the springs. This was the biggest highlight of the trip for me personally because, for whatever reason, I felt infinite patience, love, and peppy-ness that I almost always feel too depleted to access. I took her and Mary’s hands, and I was my best-Mama self the whole time. It was a revelatory experience for me because I glimpsed what I want to be capable of on a daily basis. I saw what I am capable of giving to my children, and it made me long to actualize and become this best version of myself all of the time. It had been so long since I have been my best self that I actually did not even know this person existed inside of me.
However, my best self disappeared afterward when the girls loaded me up like a coatrack before they peed in the restrooms, and when I reached to flush after Mary peed, one of her mittens fell in the potty. I snatched it up, but it was soaked and I decided to throw it and its match away. I couldn’t handle the idea of toting home all of those public-toilet germs.
Mary threw a huge tantrum and I was not patient. That was sad.
And then on the ride home Ammon threw up everywhere. Clarissa was screaming bloody murder the whole time, so when we stopped to clean up Ammon, I had to nurse Clarissa and Abe was left to clean it all up. Bless him.
But it was, all in all, a wonderful day. We love Yellowstone, and Abe and I both felt transformed from different parts of the trip.
Karin, Abe’s mom, snagged a great deal on a condo by Yellowstone and wasn’t able to use it, so she passed it on to us. It came at the end of Abe’s quarter, and he was dying for a trip to reset himself after all of the work stress. Even though I had my initial reservations about the trip, I could tell Abe really needed a getaway.
The condo was reserved from Sunday through Tuesday, so we left at 10am on Sunday, just as Conference was starting. We listened in the car and drove like crazy so as to miss the Conference crowds on the I-15 when it ended. We sailed past Salt Lake with plenty of time and did not stop until we were sure we had outpaced the crowds.
The drive up to Yellowstone was beautiful. The colors are changing, and the route is so pleasant.
However, when we got to the condo, we encountered three surprises that had me wanting to head straight back home.
The first thing I discovered in the condo was that I was on my period. I could not believe it. Normally my body is aggressively fertile, even when I am nursing, but this was a new level of ridiculous. I felt like my body was trying to kill me! Clarissa has not had one drop of formula and she is not even six weeks old–and I am on my period. It felt so wrong and unfair.
Right after that discovery, I moodily headed to the kitchen to feed everyone dinner (Ramen), and as the kids were eating Abe came in and said he thought we were having an earthquake. The floor was shaking, and so the girls and I crawled under the heavy oak table. I was holding Ammon by the ankles while he tried every which way to escape while Abe went to get Clarissa off the bed.
Just then the front desk called and we found out that we were above the laundry room with giant machines that shake the floors. By that point, Lydia was sobbing with fright, Mary was singing a little Daniel Tiger song to herself about “taking your grown-up’s hand and everything will be okay,” and Ammon was running around like crazy because he was so relieved to be free. (We learned that in a real earthquake, I will just have to lie on top of Ammon because there is no other way to keep him down.)
The next thing we knew, someone was banging on the door. I was tired and stressed and half dressed from nursing Clarissa, and when I opened the door I met a very angry downstairs neighbor who wanted to know if we were playing football in our condo. I was so out of it that I said all of the wrong things (totally unintentionally) and the neighbor probably thought I was both a brat and an idiot. She left and after that we didn’t allow Ammon to touch the floor for the next three days. We just carried him everywhere, and the girls learned to tiptoe and whisper.
Abe relieved things by taking the kids swimming, after which we put everyone down. I went to bed early and Abe sat for hours by the fire engaged in one of his favorite activities: pondering work, life, and God.
Abe had a wonderful day, and I could have had a great day too had I not been so easily stressed out by things that should not have stressed me out to the degree they did.
Ammon in his king size bed. He loved it and slept so well in it!Dinner post-“earthquake”The kids piled into Ammon’s bed to watch TV together.Cable TV saved our lives this trip.
I had plans to crochet calmly while listening to General Conference on Saturday. Instead, we ended up de-cluttering and deep cleaning the house all day long–while we listened to Conference. I think it started with trip preparation for Yellowstone, and the day just ended up sort of spiraling out of control and into full blown clean-up mode.
The house looked amazing afterward, and we felt so proud and tired.
Of course, it helped that we were powered through by the incredible messages from General Conference.
I felt wholly uplifted and inspired by the talks. I honestly feel that this General Conference has had a more catalyzing effect in my life for spiritual change and repentance than any other conference I can remember. I feel, not just in my heart but in my bones, closer to God because of these talks.
On Friday Abe and I had the best date. We drove to the Ashton Gardens at Thanksgiving Point. With Clarissa in her stroller, we walked all around the beautiful gardens, including the incredible Light of the World statue garden. This garden is full of life-size bronze sculptures of scenes from the New Testament, and it has a wonderful feeling about it.
One of my favorite parts was eavesdropping on a good dad who was leading his kids around having them recite the scripture stories that go along with the sculptures. My favorite moment was when his toddler ran to the other side of the sculpture and refused to cooperate. This sweet dad used his calm, churchy voice and threatened to “swat his bottom” if he didn’t come back and recite the scripture. The irony in the scenario was just so funny, and Abe and I totally related to him.
My most favorite part was talking nonstop with Abe for hours in the beautiful gardens. We talked about everything and just enjoyed being together so much. It was a beautiful, crisp evening, and we enjoyed every aspect of the setting and our togetherness.
Afterward we drove to Aubergine for dinner before heading home. It felt great to fill our bodies with healthy food, and Aubergine gave further inspiration for future grain bowls.
This is going to be a very long post. I work sort of hard for birthdays, and so I want to capture all of the details. Seeing my kids happy on their birthdays is one of my most favorite things, and Mary was very, very happy on her birthday.
First of all, a just a few things I love about five year old Mary.
She has the cutest voice. I mean, her little voice and lisp are the cutest things EVER.
This goes along with the first thing, but Mary took charm lessons in her pre-earth life. She has these little mannerisms and facial expressions that are straight out of a child-of-charm book. She’s been this way all of her life, and her charm has only grown with each year.
Mary loves to learn! She picks up things pretty quickly, and she always has an eager attitude about learning more.
Mary is very affectionate and loving. She writes “I love you cards” to the loved ones in her life frequently on her own volition. They melt their recipients’ hearts.
Mary has the capacity to be purely joyful. When she is excited and happy, her emotions shine through in every part of her body. She jumps, skips, laughs, grins, and hops up and down. It is so beautiful to see Mary happy.
On her birthday morning, Mary woke up beaming with excitement and came smilingly downstairs to discover her birthday balloons. I had gotten up early to make her the breakfast she requested: salmon, peas, and rice. I also baked her an apple sharlotka cake so we could sing to her over breakfast. She was radiant, happy, and so cute throughout it all.
After we sang to her, she opened her sewing box before my mom had to whisk Lydia to school. Mary had two requests for her birthday: a sewing box and high heeled shoes like the ones her neighbor friend wears. She wanted a sewing box because, as she declared with her hands on her hips, “Every girl in this family has a sewing box except for me!”
I didn’t get her the shoes. However, she loved her sewing box! One of my favorite things about Mary is how adorable she is when she is happy. She says thank-you so enthusiastically and practically dances with appreciation while she grins and sometimes jumps for joy. She displayed this kind of adorableness when she opened her gifts, which is one of the reason I got her more than one. I just looooove to watch Happy Mary.
After breakfast, I gave her a break from piano and let her play with some of her gifts. I also let her watch Fantasia with Ammon. Ammon is learning to watch TV!! Glory be and Hallelujah.
Anyhoo, after her carefree morning, I let Mary open almost all of the rest of her presents before serving her her lunch request of broccoli cheddar soup. I made a bunch Tuesday night so that lunch would be a breeze, but sadly, she did not like the leftovers as much as when I first made the soup. Both girls have been getting really picky about leftovers recently. But even if she didn’t like the soup, Mary was still in a great mood when she left for kindergarten.
At kindergarten, she got to be the line leader, display everything she stuffed (and I mean stuffed) into the special show-and-tell box, and distribute unicorn-ring cupcakes to everyone.
While Mary was at kindergarten, I called the Bean Museum to confirm that they were planning on Mary’s party. To my horror, I learned that they expected us to come to them and that there was no way they could send someone to us because they had another out-of-house show at the exact same time.
I panicked. I had called the director and spoken with her directly about the party, so I was shocked at this development. After talking with Abe, I decided to text parents and get permission to drive the kids there. Then I called the director back to let her know we would be coming to the in-house show.
After we picked up Lydia, we returned home and cleaned house for the birthday party. Luckily, I had purposefully scheduled the party at an inconvenient time, so not many kids were a) coming and b) in need of drivers. Abe and I took all of the kids between our cars, and we met up with another little girl, Jakely, (Mary’s best little kindergarten girlfriend) there.
After all of the back and forth between the director and me, I could not believe it when we realized the museum had no idea we were coming and did not have a show planned…!!!!!!!! At that point, I started to honestly wonder whether the director was on drugs. I had just talked to her about the show two hours earlier–twice!!
Fortunately, the guy in charge of the show was able to pull off a spectacular, spur-of-the minute performance. He was absolutely delightful, and all of the grown-ups enjoyed the show as much as the kids. He was a tortoise enthusiast and a whistler extraordinaire, and our favorite part was when he opened up the Q&A by explaining what questions were and what stories were. The kids were supposed to ask questions, not tell him stories. In spite of his numerous, hilarious examples and his detailed instructions, one of the little neighbor girls could not help herself. She raised her hand, and when the instructor called on her she said,
“I….I….I….”
“Is this a question or a story?” he asked.
Breathlessly, she blurted, “It’s a really quick story!!! IoncesawascorpianinSt.George!!”
Abe and I thought that was so funny.
Anyway, Mary was in her element because the instructor made a big deal about her birthday and let her have triple the turns of anyone else in the game they were playing, and then she got to choose what animal to pet. To our surprise, she picked the snake over the cute tortoise and the interesting dragon lizard. I chose not to pet it.
Then we came home to the piñata, cake, and presents. When we got home, we saw our new neighbor kids outside and invited them to the party. A family of six just moved in. That means we have SIXTEEN CHILDREN on our little cul-de-sac. If you count the house just perpendicular to the cul-de-sac, we have NINETEEN!! And that’s not even going down the street in either direction. We feel so blessed.
So with the new additions to the party, we had a lot of kids to liven up the piñata and everything else. Mary got twice as many turns as anyone else on the piñata, which was fine because her swats barely did anything to the zebra. One of the big kids ended up batting it down.
After the piñata and pizza, Mary excitedly opened the rest of her presents, including a pogo stick from Clark, Swathi, and Soren that was the hit of the party for the rest of the evening.
Mary also got this piggy bank from Baps and Boppa that she absolutely LOVED.
Mary could hardly be convinced to go to bed after that. She was flying so high and so out of her mind with happiness and excitement. Even though birthdays are hard and stressful on the planning/execution end for the grown-ups, it was so worth it to see Mary’s joy. I love this little, over-the-top cute, charming, fun-loving and smart FIVE year old. She is a bright light in our lives.
On Tuesday we did birthday prep. Mary spent the morning stuffing her piñata and playing with the toys that were supposed to go in it. I hope enough toys made it into the piñata for everyone at the party to get some!
In the afternoon Lydia had climbing camp, and after we had dinner. At dinner Abe asked if we were all excited about our upcoming Yellowstone trip, at which point Mary got mad because we were not talking about her birthday. I think I must have said something that upset her (such as “Mary, it’s okay, please just eat your dinner), at which point she screamed that I was being mean and went upstairs. She proceeded to poop in her pants on purpose to get back at me for being so mean. (This was after she pooped all over the floor and her bed the night before. I couldn’t even believe it.)
I spent the rest of the evening in high dudgeon. I told Abe not to wrap half of her presents because I planned on either sending them back or giving them to her at Christmas. Finally around midnight I changed my mind and wrapped the rest of her presents. I have this image of happy Mary skipping excitedly and talking about her birthday all month, and I wanted her day to fulfill her happy expectations–even if she seriously, seriously ticked me off the night before.
Mondays can be a little crazy because I try to get Lydia up early for harp before school, and after school we head straight to ballet and tumbling. I drop the girls off and head home to make dinner so that we can eat exactly when Abe brings them home. We need to eat right away because Mary has a piano lesson at 6:15, and then we hustle everyone to bed by 7:30. It is crazy.
Mary finally, finally passed off her Twinkle Variation A, though! I was proud of her. Our 100 chart is sort of working. We made the chart after I lamented to Abe that I have no idea how Mary is ever going to make progress, and the chart has really helped her focus and buckle down. I was proud of her for passing off that piece.
Abe took a picture of dinner. I have been reading a cookbook on grain bowls, so we had one. That’s kale pesto, fresh mozzarella, tomatoes from our garden, corn, farro, and maple soy glazed salmon. I want to make more!
Sunday was my last day at home with Clarissa before we start going to church again. I mourned that fact while I was home with her. I have loved the peace and quiet of being home with her. This Sunday was especially sweet because Saturday was so hectic, cold, and rainy. On Sunday Clarissa and I snuggled up in bed while I watched the incredible Women’s Conference from Saturday and crocheted/nursed. It was so warm, sweet and cozy.
Meanwhile, Abe and my mom were busy handling the kids at church. I don’t think their experience was quite as peaceful…
