Author: lilydarais

On Saturday Abe had to get up early so he could drive Lydia to Thanksgiving Point’s Garden Room for Lydia’s harp recital. The harps had to be there by 9am, rehearsal started at 10am, pictures were at 12:30, and the recital started at 1pm. It was a marathon. As Abe sat there sleepily working on his computer at 9am, the teachers tuned the harps.

“That’s right,” he thought to himself, slightly smug. “You made me haul the harp up here this early–you go ahead and tune that harp!”

When he told me this thought, I laughed. Tuning the harp is a chore that doesn’t isn’t performed as often as it should be in our house.

While Abe and Lydia were gone, the kids and I visited the Provo Farmer’s Market in search of Italian plums. There weren’t any! This is the first September since moving to Utah that we have not had plum torte yet, and I suppose it won’t happen at all this year.

Abe and Lydia picked the rest of us up and tried to get back in time for pictures. We were a little late–eep. At that point, Abe was starving because he hadn’t had breakfast or lunch, and so we tried to pick up something before the recital. We ended up missing Lydia’s first piece, but luckily we got to hear the rest. It was a group recital where all of the harpists play together, so it wasn’t like we missed her solo (this is how I comforted myself).

After the recital, we went to the Fall Harvest Festival at Thanksgiving Point. We got there just in time to see a pumpkin break the state record. It weighed 1,066 pounds! While we were there, the girls got their faces painted.

Then we headed over to Cornbelly’s. It was cold and rainy, but we were determined to get our money’s worth and so we stuck it out. We all had a great time.

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Then we went to Kneaders. The house got cleaned on Friday, and we were highly incentivized to keep it that way. We finally figured out that if we just never live there, the house will stay clean.

 

Abe and I both had great days today. Abe and his team are finishing the quarter pretty well, and I felt relatively functional. My toe seems on the mend again, so I can sort of do stuff again! That meant a bunch of laundry got done and put away, the kids were fed/nursed multiple times, I took the kids to Qualtrics for homework and play after school, and Abe and I went on a date.

On our date we went to the library where I checked out books on knitting, crochet, all the needle crafts, canning and preserving, quinoa bowls, dressing yourself after your body has changed, Tiger babies who struck back, Martha Stewart Cakes, and the best cookie recipes from Gourmet Magazine. After all that, I saw a picture of a newborn baby in a knitted hat and decided I really should just be staring at my baby all day long. This stage will be gone before I know it!

On Thursday I mainly stayed home and nursed my broken toe. I attempted to get Ammon to watch TV independently, with moderate success. I feel certain if I could just get him interested in screens my life would dramatically change for the better. So far he is only interested when there is a person right there with him coaching him through the narrative/song/whatever.

I also took Lydia to her harp lesson and made a ton of potato leek soup.

Abe made it through an amazing day, which was incredible since he only had three hours of sleep the night before. It is the end of the quarter and crunch time. He was up until 2am working on deals, and then he woke up at 5:30am with me when Clarissa woke up. He had an early meeting, so he just rolled out of bed and got ready for the day.

On Wednesday we packed it in. After saying goodbye to Shauna in the morning, Ammon, Mary, Clarissa and I headed to a nearby park to enjoy the September morning.

After the park, we went to the Provo Library to catch story time before heading home to grab lunch. I distributed sandwiches and granola bars in the car so we could be on time for Mary’s kindergarten drop-off.

Then we headed home for a “nap.” Mostly I changed Ammon’s diaper a couple times and Clarissa nursed. I tried to squeeze in some crochet, but that was pretty minimal.

At the end, Chelsea surprised us by dropping off loads of beautiful produce from her garden! She is my hero, and I want to be just like her someday.

Then we picked up the girls and headed to the Orem Library to do homework. I like this new routine because Ammon enjoys playing in the kid section while the girls get their work done, and we’re not scrambling before school to squeeze it in.

After homework, we went to another park and played for two hours. Abe joined us at the end, much to the kids’ delight. I noticed that before Abe arrived, the kids played on the park. After Abe arrived, the kids played on Abe. He makes a great climbing wall and swing set.

Then it was home for dinner and bed. I re-broke my toe twice in the evening and it hurts today. Ammon stepped on it after scripture study, and while I was listening to Abe talk through his work stress, I stubbed my toe on the vacuum. I was too upset to blog after that, so I just went to bed angry. It is throbbing today, so we’re having a more laid back morning.

I am praying Ammon will learn to love TV. Right now he and Mary are in front of Fantasia.  I know I’m supposed to minimize screen time, but with Ammon in his current state, I want to MAXIMIZE it. Sadly, he doesn’t stay put in front of a screen, but I am crossing my fingers today and hoping against hope Fantasia keeps him planted on the couch– and out of mischief!!–while my toe sort of heals.

I have a video of Ammon saying “Too!” when I tell him I love him. I think it’s so cute.

And I really was crazy and let Ammon and Mary help me make lasagna tonight. It was crazy because we have houseguests for dinner and the night, and we were trying to get this thing in the oven in time for dinner. I did not plan on Clarissa being uncharacteristically fussy, therefore I did not have time to clean the mess before Shauna, Jeff, and their friend Tom arrived. My mom did the heavy lifting on the mess while I tried to nurse Clarissa, and I felt so bad about that.

The kids had a great time “cooking” though!

Today while I was ordering groceries online, Mary came running upstairs and told me that Ammon had climbed onto the counter and was stuffing his face with cookies. I seriously contemplated just letting him be, and then I envisioned all of the house covered in chocolate cookie crumbs. I reluctantly went downstairs, pulled Ammon away from the cookies and cleaned him off.

Then during Mary’s piano practice, Ammon got unusually quiet. I rushed to the kitchen to see what was going on and saw Ammon pouring milk all over the counter. I had thought that gallon jug was empty, but guess not. I cleaned him again and resumed piano with Mary.

Later in the day, I brought this on myself:

I invited Ammon to help me prepare the soufflé bowl by spreading butter and cheese in it. He loved his task and took it a couple steps further. He ate the butter and cheese and got cheese everywhere. I didn’t really mind cleaning up this mess. Also, note he is wearing Mary’s sandals from last year, which he spied when we were sorting out the summer shoes on Saturday. He fell in love and demanded to wear them. He is one and can wear the shoes Mary wore when she was almost four.

I feel like I have been complaining about Ammon a lot lately. That is sad, because even though he is a handful, he is such a cute, sweet boy. He has my whole heart. Here are some cute things he does that make me melt even after he’s thrown avocados everywhere, ripped up his favorite book, thrown hundreds of wipes on the ground or smeared butter over the floor.

Whenever we say, “I love you!” to Ammon, he always grins and says, “Too!!!” (which means, “I love you, too!”).

He LOVES to sing and read, and the combination of the two makes him slightly crazy with joy. I make up little songs to go with some of the pictures in his books. If I even sing the song just one time, he always remembers that there’s a song associated with that picture, and he will fall apart until I remember and sing it again whenever we read the book.

He loves to dance and does the sweetest, happiest dances when he hears music.

He loves dogs, planes, and trucks. He can hear the garbage truck from far away and always runs to the window to watch it with excited anticipation. Tonight in the middle of crying in the bath, he heard a dog bark (I couldn’t even hear the dog over his crying, so I have no idea how he heard it), and immediately stopped crying, smiled, and said, “Dog!”. I listened and indeed there was a dog barking.

He adores being with Abe on his runs. As soon as we tell Ammon he gets to ride in the buddy bubble, he lights up and yells, “ducks!” because he hopes Abe will run to the duck pond.

He calls his basketball hoop a “shoop.” We think he got confused because you shoot hoops, therefore: “Shoop!”

That doesn’t begin to cover why we love Ammon, but we sure love him. His guileless, sweet, well-intentioned little heart makes mine beat faster.

As for the other kids, Clarissa is the most alert baby I can ever remember having. Abe says I said that Ammon had very wise eyes, which I don’t doubt even if I can’t remember that at all. But Clarissa is SO alert and aware of her surroundings…when she is awake (which, let’s be honest, is still not often). She has the biggest eyes and stares intently at people and patterns trying very obviously to understand.

Here is a picture of Clarissa trying to understand what just happened to her after Abe sang “The Grand Old Duke of York” to her and made her do the motions. A video is also below.

Lydia is also in love with Clarissa. She is just as sweet with her as she was with Ammon and always is asking to hold her. She beams whenever she looks at her and pronounces her “the cutest baby.” She is such a good big sister. Any disappointment she initially experienced at Clarissa’s gender has since completely vanished. She loves her baby sister.

Mary is also very sweet with Clarissa, although she seems to only ask to hold her when Lydia asks first. But she is very sweet and proud of Clarissa, and we are so happy that all of the children have taken so well to their littlest sibling.

 

On Saturday I woke up and decided I needed a hair cut. The A-line I got months ago was growing out to the point that I couldn’t just wash it and go. I need a haircut that washes-and-goes.

My hairdresser moved! It was so sad, so I tried out a new one. She was so sweet, but I really did not like her work. She was brand new and in her first job, and now my hair shows that. Oh, well. Good thing I’m not in the running for any most-put-together-human awards.

Abe took Ammon on a run to the duck pond, and that thrilled Ammon’s little heart to bits.

Sadly, Abe’s knee got inflamed on the way home, and he limped for the rest of the day. I felt so bad for him.

The girls enjoyed playing outside the whole day. In the evening my mom went for a swim while Abe took the kids to Target.

I stayed home with Clarissa to nurse her and clean the house.

I am dying to declutter the: kitchen, my closet, my bathroom drawers, the medicine cabinet, the mantle, the laundry room, and the piano room. That’s what that nesting urge is for–to get the house ready BEFORE the baby comes because afterwards, it is soooo hard to do anything! The minute I feel perky enough to do a project, Clarissa feels perky enough to nurse or Ammon decides to tear something apart or one of the girls has a tantrum.

However, on Saturday evening, I did manage to put three puzzles away and “help” Abe hang some garlands. (Really I just told him where to hang them.)

 

On Friday morning Mary, who has been exceptionally well behaved recently, completed ten repetitions each of all of her piano pieces. This is an amazing feat for her, because most of our practice sessions are spent redirecting attention. It is a miracle if we can repeat one piece ten times (correctly), much less all of them.

Even though it was thundering and raining outside, I took the kids to the Kangaroo Zoo bounce house as a reward. Ammon and Mary were in heaven.

Seeing my kids so happy made me SO happy. My heart was just full watching them run around panting with excitement and grinning ear to ear.

Clarissa was so sweet and just slept on my chest in the Solly the whole time.  I felt sorry for her because she woke up hungry right as it was time to go. It was a long ride to the parking lot of Mary’s kindergarten, where I finally nursed her.

Also, Abe brought home NO work this weekend! It was a much needed miracle.

On Thursday after school I took the kids to the library. I had not pre-registered the girls for the cool discovery program, so we stood in the standby line and made it in by the skin of our teeth!

While the girls were making clay fossils, Ammon, Clarissa and I hung out in the preschool-play area. Ammon was overjoyed to learn he was allowed out of his stroller. We played and read books until 5pm. I want to do this every week–it was so fun!

Ammon and Clarissa have competing needs. Clarissa needs me to be home, comfy, and available for nursing at any time. Ammon needs to be out. of. the. house.

He is tired of being cooped up, and he is destroying everything in sight. So I have been just nursing Clarissa in parking lots and depending on the Solly wrap to keep her happy while I try to preserve my house and keep Ammon happy (not, er, in that order).