This week was better

Last week we all got sick. This week we were all better for the most part. Ces still has gunk in her eyes, and I still cough occassionally, but we're all functioning normally. Yay!

On Monday, I kept Emilia home from school, just in case she was still contagious from her fever. She was fine all day, so she went to school Tuesday just in time to make it to her class field trip to the pumpkin patch. She was excited about playing in the "corn box" (a sandbox type thing with corn kernels instead of sand), petting the pigs and picking up the chickens, and picking out the biggest pumpkin.

We gave the girls a bath Tuesday night and since she slept on wet hair, Cecily woke up rocking a David-Bowie-esque 'do Wednesday morning. Of course, she wouldn't stand still long enough for me to take a good picture of it. This is the best I got.

I was taking pictures of Cecily, so I had to take some of Mira, too.

Mira kissing Cecily's foot. I don't know.

I've been struggling with my depression lately. Exercising was enough after Cecily was born to stave off the lows, but it's slowly but steadily been getting worse.  I'm trying some supplements to see if I can improve my mood without having to deal with the side-effects of depression medication.  I only started this week, so the jury is still out on that. But on Wednesday, I decided that I NEEDED to look good even if I was staying home all day. I just needed the self-esteem boost.  I think I succeeded.

Mira needed in on the picture taking again.  She's so adorable.  Look at that perfect skin! I love being goofy with her.

Emilia had fall break on Thursday and Friday. Since we didn't take a family vacation this summer, we decided have a "staycation" this weekend. I had so much fun playing and spending time with my kids. It was wonderful.

Steve took Thursday afternoon off. We had an early dinner and then took them to the Museum of Natural Curiosity at Thanksgiving Point. This was the most expensive thing we did all weekend, and my least favorite.  The museum opened last April and has been crazy busy ever since. If we had gone on a school day during the day, it probably would have been fine, but since it was fall break for the entire county, there were too many kids there for any of us to really enjoy it.  Although Steve says he had fun.

Friday morning we decided to take the girls to the Provo Rec Center. They have a new multi-million-dollar facility with a kid-friendly pool.  The kid-friendly part wasn't as good as the one we played in when we went to visit the Nelsons last month. This one had water spraying and splashing everywhere and the young kids were always afraid to go up to the top. Cecily loves slides, but she didn't want to go down more than a few times because she kept getting doused in water when she got up the stairs.

That afternoon, Emilia, Mira and I went on our first geocaching outing. We found three that were near us. Mira was enamored. She keeps asking if we can go treasure hunting again. Then that evening, the two older girls had a birthday party to go to, so Steve and I enjoyed a quiet dinner with Cecily.

Saturday we decided to go to the Clark Planetarium and watch a show and then go on a hike to Ensign Peak. My mom was nice enough to watch Cecily for us, since the star show would be right during her nap.

Mira and Emilia "on Mars."

 The show was fun.  It made me extremely motion sick, but it was cute. Mira cried during all but the last 10 minutes because she was scared of how dark it was. But now she says, "The show was so fun!"  Silly kid. The Planetarium had a bunch of exhibits to look through, too, so we took a while and looked through them all.

Walking on the moon.

Our hike was a short hike--about a 1/2 mile, and there wasn't a lot to look at on on the way up. The girls started complaining about 10 steps in. "Are we there yet?" "How long will this take!?" "This is too hard! I can't walk another step."  Finally I told them to pretend they were Twilight Sparkle trying to make it to the top of the Crystal Castle and beat King Sombra. There wasn't another word of complaint. Although, I was called Spike the rest of the hike.

A view of the city through the trees.

The great Salt Lake is back there blending in with the sky.

The view from the top.

The monument at the top. Emilia pretended the ball on top was the Crystal Heart.

Mira's face. Haha.

I couldn't see the screen, so this was my best guess. Not bad. Downtown is behind Steve's head.

After our hike we got Papa Murphy's pizza and ate it at my parents' house. Today we're at Nick and Wilda's again celebrating Steve's birthday. I'll put the pictures up next week. He'll be 39 on Thursday. Hard to believe.

We're sick and Costco wasn't helping

Everybody but Steve got sick this week. Cecily and Mira both had double ear infections when we went to the doctor on Tuesday. We went in because Mira kept saying her ear hurt. And then her cheek. And then her ear again. Then we went to pick up the prescription. Talk about a quest!

I told the doctor to send the prescription to a pharmacy that was between their office and our house. When we got there, they said the doctor had actually sent the prescription to the sister pharmacy that is in Springville (the town we live in). They were willing to transfer the prescriptions, but then they let me know that they wouldn't have enough for both girls anyway. Would I like to get one girl's prescription here and the other one there? Umm...no.

So, I told them to leave it at the other pharmacy. Then I bought some donuts and some ice cream to treat the girls when we got home and got back in the car. On the way to the other pharmacy, I called Steve to bring him up to date. He suggested I get the prescription at Costco instead, since we needed gas and some essentials anyway. I thought, "Hey, why not? It's almost lunch time. We can get pizza for lunch and check everything off our list at once." So I called the doctor's office and had them send the prescription to Costco instead.

It wasn't until I parked at Costco that I remembered I had ice cream with me. *whacks head with palm* Too late now, though. I'll just cross my fingers that my kids eat fast and it doesn't melt all over my car before we get back out here.

I requested the prescription and bought my essentials. The pharmacy tech said it would be about half an hour, so we got our food and ate. It took us almost exactly half an hour. "How fortuitous," I thought. Silly me. The girls were getting really cranky and Mira looked like she might fall asleep in what was left of her pizza, so we rolled over to the pharmacy to pick up our prescription. Here is where the pharmacy tech tells me: "Oh, well, it took us longer than we thought because another pharmacy ran that prescription through your insurance, so we had to call them and tell them to back it out. Then we had to run it through our system. (And apparently they couldn't start filling it during this process.) So it's going to be another 20 minutes."  Are you kidding? "Do you have any idea what kind of meltdown my kids are going to have in the next 20 minutes?" I wanted to ask her. But I didn't. I just gave her a look and said, "Okay. I guess I'll walk around for 20 minutes," with a meaningful glance at my screaming children.

I ended up taking them out to the car and filling gas while we waited, so I guess it was okay.  Mira fell asleep on the drive home and took a 3 hour nap. Wahoo! Right? It would have been a bigger Wahoo! if Cecily hadn't refused to nap ALL DAY. She screamed in her crib for over 2 hours (not consecutively) that day and then went to bed at 6pm.

That night I decided to have insomnia for 5.5 hours, so Steve was a nice hubby and stayed home from work on Wednesday to take care of us all.

Thursday I had writing group. Which is basically girls' night out with a theme. :) I love going. I feel blessed to have 6 women in my life that I relate to and can laugh with (you know, other than family).

Since I'd had a number of bad nights of sleep. I got a sore throat and a cough out of the deal. Nothing terrible, just annoying.

Friday, we went up to my mom and dad's house. We hadn't seen them since the first of September. Unfortunately, two of my three girls had fevers for at least half the day, so they spent it sitting on the couch, watching movies with Nana. I'm glad we got to see her anyway, though. Kids need their grandparents.

Saturday, I made salsa for canning with produce from my garden. I got all these tomatoes from ONE plant. I swear the compost we got from Haylee's dad was magic. Everything I grew this year was three times as large as a normal crop.  Below the tomatoes is a picture of me with one of my onions.  That sucker is like the size of Cecily's head. Craziness.

Today, everybody but Steve stayed home from church. We don't need to pass on whatever it is we've had this week. We stayed home from Grandma and Grandpa's house, too because cousins were there and didn't want it either. I ended up making T-bone steaks, creamy garlic pasta, and broccoli, with zucchini brownies for dessert, so we didn't do too bad. :)

Here's to a better week next week! (At least, less sickness.)

Life is good. And normal. Pretty much.

Looking back at the pictures I took, we had a fun week.  Most of it was just stuff we do normally, but I'm enjoying my kids a lot more now that they are all a little older. One out-of-the-ordinary thing we did do was go to a BYU football game. Steve and I went while the kids stayed home with a babysitter.

Steve's sister Heather and her family and Grandma and Grandpa went to the game, too. Emilia REALLY wanted to go to the game, but it didn't start until 8:15pm and went until midnight. It was going to be a little cold and I didn't know if she would get bored sitting there that whole time.

Looking back, I think it would have been fine, but oh well. We'll have to plan to go next year with the girls.  The game was TERRIBLE, though. We had 4 guys get injured, including the Heisman-contending quarterback. Then we lost to a team we were expected to beat by 3 touchdowns. Tragic and depressing on so many levels. Bleh.

Anyway...we also went to the park a couple times, 

worked on our fairy house, 

watched General Conference, 

Cecily wasn't feeling well. It was fun to cuddle with her.

Found out tonight that she probably got hand, foot, and mouth disease from cousin Lincoln.. Pray no one else gets it!

had a "dance party," and 

(I) worked on hanging some more stuff on the walls and Halloween decorations.

A few other random things: Mira walked into the kitchen the other morning and said, "Why is the praying mantis right there?"
"Right where?" I ask.
She points to the wall in the living room, so I go look. This is what I see:

Needless to say, I helped him outside.

Emilia melted my heart with this the other day. I found it in her backpack when I was cleaning up:

The color on these is terrible, but Mira is cute, so you're getting them anyway.

In other news, Steve has accepted the job at Oracle. We're not sure when he'll start; they're still processing paperwork.  But thank you to any who sent prayers and good thoughts our way. I'm excited for him to start this new adventure!

Not much

This week, I can't remember anything particular happening. I've been hanging stuff on my walls all week. We had family pictures done, and I had them printed. I did a gallery wall in our entry way, too. Mira had a play date on Friday afternoon. Steve and I were going to go play tennis on Friday, but it started raining on our way there. We played a game instead and I WON! It was Carcassonne, so I can't say I outplayed him. It was mostly luck. 

Saturday we went up to Nicole and Tristan's (Jane and Meg's) house. We were supposed to go to Lagoon with Grandma and Grandpa and the Nelsons, but again, it rained. All. Day. We decided to go swimming at their "aquatic center," and that ended up being really fun. They had a water slide and a kids area with spouts and sprays and a small slide that Cecily must have gone down 20 times. I didn't take any pictures because I didn't bring my phone with. Taking my phone near a large body of water just isn't a good plan.

Today was a pretty normal Sunday. Church and a tasty Sunday dinner with the Watts'.

I've done some more free-writes, if you are interested in reading: http://scribblesanddabbles.blogspot.com/

First grade photo shoot

The day before Emilia went to first grade, I did a photo shoot of her. I made her wear the outfit she wanted to wear to school and we did a bunch of pictures.  Of course, the sisters had to get in on the action, too.  They turned out really cute.

As I show you the pictures, I'll tell you about this past week, because I didn't take any pictures.

Isn't she beautiful?

Both girls had play dates this week. Emilia on Monday and Mira on Friday. Both were at friends' houses, so that was nice. When Mira left, it was just me and Cecily and then she went down for a nap.  It was glorious.

Tuesday, Steve took the day off of work because he was supposed to have two job interviews. The first one was a final interview with Oracle. It was a phone interview and it went pretty well, considering the interviewer was distracted by some emergencies that had come up. The second one was supposed to be an hour-long Skype interview with AtTask. And they flaked. No one called. No one knew who was supposed to call. Etc. Steve was really annoyed. And understandably. He wouldn't have taken the day off of work for a 20 minute phone interview during his lunch break.

But, since he was home all day I took advantage.  I had a dentist appointment, then a presidency meeting, and I took dinner to a neighbor that night.

Wednesday Emilia only had a 1/2 day, so Mira was happy to have her sister home to play with. Steve also got a phone call at work from Oracle offering him the job which would be a nice raise. Oddly, that same day, his supervisor at his current job came to him and told him they were giving him a raise. I was happy for him and proud of him. I also did a few more visits to sisters in the ward that night. I think we finished off the list this week!

Thursday morning, me and Mira and Cecily went berry picking. I picked three pounds of raspberries and I'm excited to use them! Thursday night Steve had game night and Friday night we went out to dinner at the Smoking Apple to celebrate Steve's good news.  Afterwards, we went and bought our first flat-screen TV.

Saturday I had a Relief Society function at our church building. We had a wonderful keynote speaker at the end who taught about the parable of the 10 virgins and how we can keep extra oil in our vessels. It was a good reminder to do small things daily to keep Christ in our lives and our testimonies strong.

After that got over, we drove up to Grandma and Grandpa's house to watch the BYU football game. We won! We have an awesome quarterback this year, so the games have actually been fun to watch. Go Cougars!

Today Tristan and Nicole drove down and we had a relaxing Sunday spending time with family. Wilda was nice enough to watch all of our kids so we could attend a session of the Ogden Temple Re-dedication.  Was that just in Utah? Or did they broadcast it outside of Utah, too? I'm not sure.

We had a busy week, but I feel very blessed. Steve has decided to take the new job with Oracle and we are excited to start on this new adventure. Who knows what it will bring?

Writing

I've been doing some quick 10-minute free-writes recently. If you want to see some of my writing, you can check them out at my other blog: http://scribblesanddabbles.blogspot.com/

We have lots to be thankful for...

Last Sunday, we went to my nephew's baby blessing up in Layton and didn't get home until late. It was Nicole's son Laef (Steve's youngest sister). Grandma and Grandpa and Great-Grandma went up also.

The sunset on the drive home was gorgeous. This doesn't do it justice.

Mira and Emilia loved being able to play with cousins.  They also got to play with them the day before because Jane and Meg and Kate came down to Orem. Nicole was running in a long relay that ended in Provo that day. When we pulled up Saturday morning, this was the site we saw:

It was so cute that they were waiting for their cousins outside because inside was just too far away. :)

I found this little guy on my windshield while shopping. I ended up putting him back in a tree.

It rained a lot that week, too.  The views were gorgeous and it was tempting to run out into the rain. But I never did. I'm to prim, I guess.

Some pictures from this last week:

Cecily loves it when she thinks she's being big. Here she is making a big mess at the dinner table.

The girls still love playing video games with their daddy. Cecily gets in on the action now, too.

Emilia started reading Charlotte's Web yesterday morning.  She said she started reading it because Daddy told her he thought she was old enough to read chapter books. So she picked up Charlotte's Web off our shelf and loved it. She finished it this afternoon.

The girls doing an art project.  We are going to make a fairy house to put in our garden.  Emilia told me, "You know this house isn't for pretend fairies, right Mom?"

Also this week, I got to go to my writing group. The group also got together Saturday night with our spouses, so they could meet the people we talk about all the time. It went way better than I was expecting. We may have to "torture" them again. :)

Steve has two interviews coming up this week that will have a strong possibility of a job offer.  Any prayers on his behalf would be appreciated. He is very unhappy with his current job, so it would be a great change for him.