Little Things

I wanted to catch up on some of the little things that have been going on...

First of all, Elijah learned to climb out of his crib so we decided to take it down and put him in a big boy bed!

His siblings were probably more excited about it than he was.

He really has done great with it,  Some nights he harasses Nate and tries to get into his bed (which Nate doesn't appreciate much) but mostly he goes right to sleep, even for naps.

Speaking of Elijah, he sure can be a troublemaker these days!  I was so excited to be done with our carpeted dining area in our last house, but I didn't realize the ramifications this change would have.  Eli can now push our dining chairs around the kitchen and climb up to get whatever he wants.  It drives me crazy!  I feel like I'm constantly putting him down and putting chairs back.

His whining has also been driving me crazy.  I've never really done this whiny, almost 2 year-old stage with a mostly non-verbal child and I feel like it's a whole new level of craziness.  I'm trying not to respond to the whining, and constant "Ma!"'s, and make him say please (he signs it) but it's not making much of a difference yet.  He's slowly starting to say more words, though, so there is hope.

Here are some of his new words:

-"Zi-zee": Lizzy

-"Kee": blankie

-"ice": ice water (he's his mother's child :)

-"bye"

-"no": his favorite word

-"uh, Mama": this is how he says thank you to me for something.

-"buh-ball": football, or basketball, or baseball, etc...

He still does a lot of motioning for what he wants and he still says "uh" for yes.  One thing that we all love is when he says prayers.  This is how it goes:

Joe or I: Dear Heavenly Father...

Eli: uh

Joe or I: Thank you...

Eli: uh

Joe or I: for this day...

Eli: uh

You get the idea.  It cracks us all up.  At least it's a start.

All of this toddler craziness prompted me to take this picture one day:

There's something about a sleeping child that makes you forgive everything they do when they're awake.

We took the older three kids and drove out to Boise for the BYU/Boise State game.  The game was seriously depressing but we still managed to have fun.  

Nate was having fun hanging out on these rails:

We stayed until the bitter end of the game and it paid off since we got a chance to meet Cosmo:

Hopefully the next game we go to turns out a little better.

I've still been loving the sunsets here:

And sunrises, too:

That one was from a morning run.  Those have been so good for my soul.  Sadly, the weather has changed and it's much colder now.  Hopefully I can still fit some of those in if I get bundled up.

The kids were so excited when we got our first snow:

It turned into quite the snowstorm and after super-low temperatures over the night, there was a lot of ice.  We got a message in the morning that school was canceled!

Snow day!

We had a fun day at home all day.  We made these cute turkeys for our Thanksgiving jar:

Elizabeth and Natalie had their very first lesson with their new piano teacher.  She mentioned that she was having a recital and asked if they wanted to play some of the songs they already knew.  They agreed and they did a great job!

They both even let me curl their hair for once:

It made me so happy. :)  I don't like how beautiful these two are.  Not one bit... :)
 Eli wanted his picture taken, too, and was hamming it up:

We went out for frozen yogurt after (even though it was freezing outside!)...

Elizabeth got the sweetest package from her teacher and her old class one day:

I was just blown away by his thoughtfulness and generosity.  It was such a boost to her during this difficult time of being the new kid and trying to make new friends.

Speaking of Elizabeth, she joined a swim team.  It's pretty relaxed--they don't really race each other during the meets, just try to improve their times.

 Here's some shots from her first meet (she's in the closest lane in each of these):

 

I wanted to record how we do our cleaning these days.  I've never been very good at getting cleaning done throughout the week.  It's hard enough just staying on top of the kitchen mess every day.  I do better when I have a time set aside to really hit it hard.  So, awhile back we instituted Saturday jobs.  Our kids have come to expect them now and generally do pretty well.  They are getting better and better at actually cleaning well, too, especially Elizabeth.  She mopped the whole kitchen/dining/entry area one day and it was the first time I thought it was as good as I could have done.

Here's an example:

I post it and the kids pick what they want.  Joe was gone that Saturday and the kids actually did really well.  It always feels good to have a clean house, at least for a couple of hours.... :)

Here's another mom victory I wanted to post:

My kids LOVE kale chips!  It's pretty funny watching them scarf them down straight from the pan.  Here's the recipe we use.  At least it's one way that I can make sure we all eat some veggies.