Time does not stop

I often think that if I could just 'freeze' this moment, all would be right with the world....but time does not stop.  Nor will it ever.

Keetley is growing up much to quickly!  She's only 10...wait!  11 1/2 months old!  

Some day she'll be our little dancer.  She just realized she can stand for a moment before toppling over.  

I am thinking the baby legs are much cuter with just the baby and not the whole outfit.  Hehehehe!  Ruffles, piggie tail, and all!  

I know that she is doing as she should be...but I'm SOOOOOOOOOOO not ready for my baby to be learning how to walk!  She's too little.  She's too sweet.  She's not yet one!  

That's it.  I want time to stop RIGHT NOW!  

Time Out For Women

I, my mom and my sister, Deseret, had an awesome chance to attend Deseret Book's Time Out For Women Event here in Idaho Falls.  

It.Was.AMAZING!!!  It did not disappoint!!!  

I thought I'd have a page of notes for each day....and came away with at least a page from each speaker, and a very long list (that had to be reasonably whittled down) of things to implement NOW to be a better wife, a better mother, and a better person.  

We tried to get some pictures, but either someone is squinting, or I have a silly curl in the middle of my forehead, or we're not looking at the camera.  LOL!  Oh wait...here's one.  Taken at the end of the day, when our makeup had been wiped off with the backs of our hands for crying, our lipstick gone from snacking, and our shirts wrinkled from sitting.  

THANK YOU mom, for this wonderful weekend! Thanks also goes to Ryan for being an amazing daddy and having fun with the kiddos while expanding our garden!

And for your viewing pleasure:

someone else had a time out today, too!

There was a LOT of mud to be washed down the shower drain!  I think we used half a bottle of soap and shampoo getting these boys squeaky clean for Sunday. 

My new focus includes:  recognizing the gifts that my children bring to our family, and helping them to develop those gifts; come to know that God made me the mother of my children (they were meant for me!); being patient with myself because God is patient with me.  

being a mom

There are some chores I procrastinate till they must be done.  Laundry and dusting my blinds and cleaning window tracks make the top of that long list.

However, there are some tasks that I find therapeutic, like vacuuming, organizing the kids' drawers, making beds, ironing and making bread.

I could make bread every day and not even feel bad about it.  I might gain a thousand pounds, but I will never tire of tasting the yeasty dough, rounding the loaves, taking them from the oven and slicing a heel to make sure it tastes good, always with room temperature butter (not margarine!) and homemade jam.

Today I had a helper!  She wanted that dough hook as bad as I wanted that scrumptious and freshly ground whole wheat dough!

Tried a new recipe, and it turned out pretty good (getting used to swapping butter for coconut oil)!  You know you're obsessed when you have more than one "whole wheat bread" recipe book, and you keep checking more out from the local library on a weekly basis.

Needing both my hands for loaf making, and Keetley needing lunch, I had to set her down for a few minutes.  :)  Such a cutie, my darling daughter, piggie tail and all!

My favorite tool:  a retro-electric heating pad from the 60's, given to me by my mother-in-law for a kinked neck and backaches during my pregnancy with Tanner....It has stayed in my kitchen, and the cover washed, because it is the heat source for raising these beauties!!!

And of course these loaves were gone by the time I got around to taking a picture of the finished product.  We ate one and gave the other three away.

Being a mom includes many joyful moments, but this is probably my favorite.  ♥

So Happy

I love these little monsters of mine.  They find joy in the simplest of forms:  Playing with baby sister on their bed, building blocks and making her giggle!

I cannot believe that in less than a month, she's going to be one year old!  Crazy at how quickly times goes by. 

Tanner is working on a 'collection' requirement for Cub Scouts....can you guess what he is organizing for his collection???

Yup.  Stickers.  He has THOUSANDS of stickers (some of those are books of 2-1000 stickers!).  The more we do together, the more I realize he is so much like me.  Maybe that's why we don't always see eye-to-eye.  

Simple Joys

Our area is badly in need of snow!  During our family and personal prayers, a plea for more snow and rain to help our crops (not only the garden we'll plant this spring, but for the grass the animals on Grandpa's ranch will need) to grow has been included.

Imagine our huge smiles when our 'bird watching' was interrupted by a spring hail storm, and an inch or so of heavy wet snow!

The two youngest boys didn't waste any time enjoying our answered prayers.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Birding

For the past week or so, Taylor has come home from kindergarten, unloaded his backpack, and reloaded it with fruits, a water bottle, a book and a blanket.  He then hangs his binoculars around his neck and says, "see ya, mom!  I'll be watching for birds.  Please don't come outside because, you know, it will scare them away!"

He then proceeds to quietly shut the back door and scale up our tree.  And then he sits.

And waits.

And watches.

On this particular day, I was able to sneak outside and capture these pictures from the cover of our back porch.

I think Grandpa Poulsen would be proud!

Squeals & Skills (& squirrels)

Been busy with my new hobby....

I'm loving the time I have to do something I've shied away from for years.  It's been fun learning a new skill, and putting it to good use!  Below are a set of leg-warmers for Keetley, and a sweater that is giving me a headache.  LOL!  I am loving the work, but it's tedious, and when I make a mistake, I feel like I've wasted an entire day undoing and redoing.  Yet I still keep working on it.  (not loving the variegated yarn as much as I thought I did, but I'll figure out something to make with it.  It's yummy stuff for a beginner like me...I had some delicious yarn in my hands, and then saw the price of over $30....I gently put it back on the shelf of the little shop I was in.  hehehe!)

I'm very grateful for the help I have received from my mom's sister and my dad's sister, and also dear friends here in my area!!!  What a wealth of knowledge I'm surrounded by!  In the picture below, the bonnet is on bottom (I took it apart, as it was too big, but will re-attach as the hood to this hoodie in due time) and the sweater on top....the bottom of the sweater is done (the detail work) and I need to figure out how to decrease or do sleeves or something....It should be a quick finish!  

I've also been busy playing with this little darling!  She's still army crawling, but is faster than a three-legged cat.  She's learning to pull herself up to this toy and the bar stools, and recently likes sitting on her knees.  She's so clever, and has her brothers wrapped around her fingers!  Truth be told, her daddy and I are also smitten.   ♥

Boys are busy with their usual antics.....being boys!  I've managed to keep them off the roof this spring, but not out of the field, which has many adventures awaiting them each day!  The other afternoon, I was tidying up my counter so I could start in on some strawberry jam, when Taylor came and insisted I look out the front door.  Reluctant to be distracted (I'm SO EASILY distracted!!!), I followed, thinking they had a cute little song they'd rehearsed for me, and upon opening the door, I found THIS:  (warning, graphic dead animal below)...

It's a miracle that it's still in one piece!!!  Hahahaha!  Poor little thing, probably wasn't watching where he was going and tripped some electrical wire somewhere....and happened into the hands of little pranksters in the making.

As much as I wanted to laugh and pretend I was scared, I decided these little sweethearts of mine needed a stern talking to.  So with three fingers, I told them, "One, if I wasn't your mother, you'd have the police called on you!   Do not EVER put a dead animal on someone's porch!  Ever!  Two, I will need to take all four of you (the neighbor girl was over) to the doctor's to get rabies shots.  You can pay for the gas to get us there.  and Three, get in this house to practice your piano!!"  Then I turned around and upon shutting the door, giggled, shaking my head with a great big smile on my face.

I quickly prayed that nobody actually touched this critter with their bare hands....last thing we need is hantavirus or the likes.   I got my kids hands washed with hotter than hot water and soap, then donned some gloves and a garbage bag to give the poor thing a proper burial.

Later that evening, I took care of business and made a flat of lovely strawberries into a flat of delicious jam (with a few containers of whole fruit for snacking).

All in a day's work as a stay-at-home mom.  Today was one of those days where "I LOVE my job!"

The Finest People

Today's been a wonderful doozy of a day, and I really want to record it.

I had all the kids dressed and ready for school, lunches made, ready to kick them out the door, when Ryan texted me, "Check the news....it's -15 outside".

In trying to stay optimistic, I pulled up the district's website, and had Tanner read what was in BIG RED BOLD letters.  A grin spread across his face as he read that school was indeed, canceled, because of freezing weather conditions and extreme wind chill.  Woot!  SNOW DAY!  *deep breath*  I put aside all hopes of making a knitting needle case, and just decided to make a day of it.

I sent the boys to play in their rooms and I headed to my own room to fold a load of laundry.  Just trying to stay on top of the pile of clothes that inevitably end up on my bed each day.  Then the phone rang.  I could see it was the school, and assumed they were calling about the canceled day....I usually get a text, but didn't this morning....funny enough, the secretary said that my boys were right there at the front office!  What the whaaaaaaaaaaa?!  I SWEAR they were playing Legos 5 minutes ago!  Then I remembered telling them "no" when they asked if I'd take them to get their money out of their desk so they could buy a goldfish (Tanner recently read a book about taking care of pets for a Wolf Arrow Point...he's determined to get the rest of that elective finished.  LOL!).  I mentioned this to the secretary, and she offered to unlock the classroom for them.  I told her that would be great, and to send them straight home.  She asked if I wanted to come get them, and I was like, "nope!  They walked there, they can walk home!".  And they did.

I was picking up pajamas from the front room floor when Tanner burst through the front door, "Mom!  Taylor's tongue is bleeding!!  Hurry!  Call dad!!!"  As if *I* wouldn't know what to do about a bleeding tongue?!  I asked what happened, and was told that he stuck it to a metal pole.

go ahead.  laugh.  I certainly did!

I asked how that could have possibly happened, and Taylor explained that he had tried it before, but that the metal wasn't thick enough....this time it was...and this time, it worked.  Much to his surprise.

Well, since we were off to a FANTASTIC start of a snow-day, I decided to jump right in, feet first, and make the day an AWESOME day.  I replied to an invitation to come play in the church gym, and decided we had better run our errands and then we could go play.

After finishing breakfast dishes and bandaging the finger I sliced cutting veggies for my morning juice (I REALLY need to sharpen my knives!), we loaded up in the van, and set out to get a few odds and ends at the grocery store, stop at the pharmacy, and drop something off to a friend.

I'm really not CRAZY to drag all 4 kids to the store...I just have a LOT of faith in them!!!  As I was zig-zagging my way back to the produce isle to get some celery (it's so hard to get everything on the list in order when there are so.many.helpers!) an elderly gentleman stopped his cart and complimented me on my cute kids.  Thankfully my little rascals were actually being obedient and I thanked him, to which he replied, "I don't know if you know this, but mothers are the finest people."

I told him he made.my.day, and smiled like I'd won the lottery.  I almost forgot the celery.

This being a mom thing is not always easy.  There are so many days I want to go get a job outside my home and say "to-heck with all this!".  But then there are days like today, when strangers notice that I'm trying to keep it together and not wring any necks.  There's moments when my oldest two have their hands around each others' necks, kicking and screaming, scratching and wailing, and I put them in timeout for one hour....two hours...and silently say "who are you kidding.  You just punished yourself!".

There are days like today when you're in the throws of a play-date with 9 other moms and there's seemingly 70 children running around the church cultural hall, and you decide that an hour is long enough...it's naps all around!  And you can't get out of there and home fast enough.

There are days like today that you decide that time-out can be educational, so you whip out the manual wheat grinder, slap on those burrs, and dump in those peanuts and make the oldest two make their own peanut butter!

There are days like today that you don't really care if the 3 year old is getting chunks of ice with his brothers, but he's wearing only underwear and cowboy boots....and you let them melt the ice in the steam bucket on the wood stove.  Don't sweat it, right?

There are days like today when you realize that you haven't practiced spelling or reading all.week.long and so you send the other kids to bed to spend time with that ONE CHILD and promptly fall asleep on the couch, giving him words from last week's list in between REM cycles.

There are days like today when I realize I'd rather be nowhere than HERE.  IN MY HOME.  WITH MY CHILDREN.  Teaching them, loving them, laughing with them, bathing them, wiping their snotty noses and dirty bums, feeding them split-pea & ham-hock soup and them licking the bowl with their little fingers.  HERE, picking up toys, tripping around forts, unplugging the computer that gets turned on one-too-many times, sitting side-by-side on the piano bench with tears streaming down both my face and theirs as we learn that practicing something ten times is indeed equal to imprisonment.  HERE, stoking the fire, making bread, washing dirty stinky socks, drying out sopping wet snow clothes, cutting one sandwich in triangles and leaving the others' open-faced.  HERE, reading stories, singing songs, blowing kisses and giggling till we've assumed our workout is complete for the day.

There is NOWHERE I want to be, other than HERE.

The finest people may have to endure some of the most un-fine moments, but it's the little moments of joy that keep them going and waking up for more.

And THAT is what I hope to become....the finest mother my children could ever ask for.

Edited to add:  My microwave just blew up.  Yup!  Smoke, sparks, and flashing of lights!  My day would not be complete without something blowing up.  It gave us a good 10 years!