February in summary

Monday, I went to counseling. After counseling, my mom agreed to watch Jules longer so I could get my hair color touched up. It ended up taking like 3 hours and I still didn't get my hair trimmed properly. 0_0

That meant I was late getting home so the girls were here by themselves for a while before I got home. Luckily we have a garage key pad that works, so they can get themselves in on occasions like this.

On Tuesday, Steve and I had our first activity with the 7-8 year old boys from church. That's our calling in our new ward and neither of us is excited about it. But, it went about as well as I expected it to. Nothing was destroyed, there were only a few fart and burp references, and we entertained them for the entire hour. The important part is that they seemed to enjoy themselves, we survived, and we'll do it again in another couple weeks.

On Wednesday, I needed to do grocery shopping, and I took Jules to the discovery museum for an hour or so before her nap. Around 1pm a couple ladies from the ward came over One of the lady's sons is getting married in a few weeks and and we made boutonnieres for the groomsmen and mothers/grandmothers out of fake flowers. There aren't many ways I can serve while taking care of a 1 year old, so it was nice to have the opportunity to do this. I also went that night to visit the lady I'm assigned to minister to. I've decided that it's really hard to minister to anyone you don't know, so I'm going to try to visit her regularly so we can get to know each other better. We did discuss one thing I know how to do that she'd like to learn--photography. I just need to figure out how to schedule that sort of thing.

Thursday, I didn't have anything on my schedule, and when I woke up, I felt like I needed to spend time with my kids. I don't know if I should have, but I let them all play hookie that day and we had a blast together. We went and got donuts (and a muffin for Mira) for breakfast. Then we hurried home, got ready and went to Thanksgiving Point farms. We got to feed a cow, a bunch of goats, a llama, some chickens, some ducks, and some sheep. Cecily and Mira rode the horses 3 times each. And Cecily, Jules, and I, went on the tractor ride. Jules was ready for her nap after that, so we headed home and it was such a nice day that Cecily and Mira played on the trampoline for the entirety of Jules' nap. Then we colored/draw/played legos downstairs for a while before starting The Croods. After our movie, we had a tasty dinner and kids took showers before bed.

Friday, we volunteered to clean the church. There is usually only like 5 people that show up to that sort of activity, but I was surprised to see like 5 families there (so like 12 people). It only took about an hour. After the kids went to bed, he and I watched Ford vs. Ferrari. I knew I would like it and I did. But the ending was hard for me to get over.

Yesterday was a weird day, but it turned out good. Steve worked on my website for quite a while and was able to get the shopping cart working. Our friend Camber's girls were dancing at the State competition just 10 minutes from our house and she texted to see if I wanted to come watch. So I went for a few minutes in the morning, then went home and fed the kids lunch and took them to Thanksgiving Point discovery museum again while Jules napped. We picked up Camber's youngest, Cassie, on the way, and she ended up staying the night and going to church with us this morning. The girls were in heaven. They love Cassie. Steve had to run to Orem to pick up his new glasses, and get some filters for our furnace. When he got back, we had dinner and then I went back over to watch the last 3 1/2 hours of competition. I wish we'd had ballroom dance at our high school growing up. I would have LOVED it.

The week prior to this one, both Steve and the girls had Presidents' Day off. Steve made us an eye appointment at 9 am, so we all had to be up early (for us) to get there on time. The optometrist was late and it ended up taking 3 hours to have our appointments, pick out glasses, and get them ordered. Ugh.

We'd planned to go to the Nicklecade as a family after, but Jules really needed a nap at that point. We decided to drive around for a while to see if she would fall asleep in her car seat and we were in luck! She conked out after only about 10 minutes. So we went to Little Ceasars and grabbed a couple of pizzas and drove to a park to eat. Everyone but me thought it was warmer than it was, apparently. They all got out of the car to eat on the picnic benches and within five minutes were back saying, "It's cold out here!" Sadly, opening the door woke up Jules, so she only got about a 20 minute nap. She's such a laid back baby, though. She was perfectly happy for our trip to Nicklecade.

Nicklecade has moved from using real nickles to using pass cards, and then they doubled the price of all the games. So it took us 1/2 the time to use up our money. I think the kids were disappointed and I don't think we'll be going back anytime soon.

The rest of the week, I don't remember too many details. I always have writing group and Emilia has a YW activity each week on Tuesdays. Wednesday, I went to the lady's house who I made boutonnieres with and we figured out what we wanted them to look like so she could get the supplies. Mira also had an activity days activity that day. I think Steve had a game night that night. Thursday I went to a book club I'd never attended before. The group only reads YA novels with some romance in them, which is totally up my alley. They invited anyone in one of my big Facebook writing groups to join, so I did. It was . . . weird. They had it at a crepe place that actually had gluten-free crepes. And they were very yummy. I also enjoyed the book we read. But the lady that "sponsored" it was a YA author herself and she seemed--what's the word?--self-important, maybe? She brought questions she'd prepared about the book and after she asked them, she'd give her answer, and then let one of us give about a one-sentence response before moving back to what she thought and then moving on to the next question. *eye roll* Of the four of us who made it though, she was the only one who'd been before, so I'm going to give it one more chance. If it's just as bad next month, I don't think I'll go again. I don't need to drive for 30 minutes to hear that chick's opinion on a book.

Friday, our dishwasher stopped working. Luckily, we still have our home warranty in effect. So I contacted them and they had someone out replacing it with a (used) unit by Saturday afternoon. Now our kitchen appliances don't match. :( But at least we only had to hand-wash dishes for 24 hours!

Oh! There was one more thing that happened that week. Steve started his new job! It was funny. He came home from his first day (Wednesday), and said he felt like he was in a season of the Office. Not because his boss was utterly ridiculous, but just because everyone was so eagerly sincere about EVERYTHING. Like they were all play-acting the part for a sitcom. He says it's still sort of surreal a week and a half later. But he's getting used to it. :D Haha.

The week before that, we had Valentine's day. That Monday, I took the girls to see my mom after school. She played with them and had Emilia make a Valentine's card. Cecily and Mira had already made theirs when my mom babysat them at the beginning of February.

Emilia had a sleepover with her friends ON Valentine's day and she had the whole thing planned out again. One of her friends gets out of school 45 minutes earlier than Emilia and her mom works full time, so I go down to Springville and pick her up. It's so funny to see her jittery excitement for the entire ride back to Saratoga. They, of course, had a blast. They made and decorated cupcakes, played hnefatafl using hersheys kisses, played Stardew Valley co-op, had baked chicken, broccoli, and grandma's rice for dinner with us, ran around outside for a while. Not in that order obviously. But it was a fun way for her to spend the holiday. I ended up taking everyone home on our way back to Springville for haircuts for all the girls. Emilia wanted to get bangs, but the other two just had a trim.

I don't really remember anything about the first week of February. But here's a cute picture of three of the girls getting ready for church one Sunday. They're just so cute.

Book covers, a quick trip, and good news

So we went to St. George over the Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend and last Sunday I pretty much had a meltdown, so it's been a few weeks. I never remember as much when I wait as when I do it each week. Especially when I don't take pictures.

The week after my last post, I met my mom to do some shopping. I found some fun stuff and didn't spend too much money, so yay me. :) I also got to go out to dinner with my friend Gina. She treated me to some amazing street tacos and lovely girl time. She is such a blessing in my life.

I had to get us ready to go to St. George at the end of the week and I've been doing a lot of work on book covers. Here are some that I've done lately.

The weekend in St. George was really great. We attended Joe's birthday party which was a splendor tournament. I came in dead last. Like nearly a third of the points of the winner. I'm usually not that bad at that game. :[ Then Nick and Wilda treated us to a lovely home-grilled steak dinner (with mushrooms!). MMMMMM. Sunday was a relaxing day with church, a quick home church lesson from Nick, more games, barbecued chicken, and naps. Not necessarily in that order. Monday Steve and Nick took the girls swimming while I got to stay home with a napping baby and do book covers. Then Steve went to play pickleball with his dad, Joe, and McKay. We got Little Ceasars for dinner for the kids and Steve and I got our St. George favorite, Mad Pita. Their spicy chicken gyro is simply amazing. We didn't get home until nearly midnight, but it was worth it for the wonderful day.

I started counseling again the next day. I'm so excited to be going again. This therapist seems confident he can help me break my negative thought habits and anger responses and I can't wait to see if he's right.

The rest of the week was busy with household projects and more book covers. I repotted all my plants. And I hung all the window blinds that had been missing since we moved in.

And I keep thinking. I did laundry. I feel like laundry takes up a significant portion of every week.

On Sunday, Emilia got called to be a counselor in her Young Women's class presidency. She had a long meeting after her activity on Tuesday and she's really excited to be a part of this. It makes my momma heart happy.

 Cecily's all orange lunch one day.

I got this train set at DI for $10 and we made  a huge track one evening after Jules went to bed.

Jules loves watching with her sisters while she drinks her bottle.

This last week, I had counseling again on Monday, but on Tuesday, I decided I was going to get Emilia's room more in order. I cleaned out the last two boxes that were in there. I used the carpet cleaner to clean the big white chair, which I moved in there from the family room since it wasn't really be used there. This is the water after I cleaned it. So gross.

Also, when I went to move the chair, I tipped it up and heard this huge slide of stuff. So i ripped open the bottom and got all this stuff out. I don't even think I got everything. Can you tell that chair was well-used at our last house?

In preparation for a book cover even coming up, I wanted to update my profile and such, so I took some selfies.

Cecily came home after her 100th day of school (which was Thursday) with this. I thought her answers were cute.

Friday I took Jules to the butterfly biosphere, Mira and Cecily had play dates, and we went out as a family to a sit down restaurant for dinner. This doesn't happen often. Eating out with 4 kids is like putting on an impromptu production of a musical in the middle of a circus. BUT it needed to be done. Because Steve was offered a new job!!!! It's exactly what he's been looking for for over a year now. It's not a pay raise, but I'm hoping he'll be MUCH happier.

Now I must go to choir practice and get a baby out of her crib. Have a lovely week!

Sick kids make for short weeks

I had very little on my calendar this week. Cecily and Mira were still too sick Monday and Tuesday to go to school so I had them home with me. Emilia made it half-way through Monday before calling to be picked up because she wasn't feeling well. Jules started with the fever Monday night. So everyone stayed home Tuesday, too. By Wednesday, they were all doing better, including Jules, thank heavens. Sick babies are so so sad. Since the kids were home to consult when I had the energy to work on it, I decided to attempt putting finishing touches on Cecily's room. We ordered a new duvet cover, spray painted some pieces for the wall, did a little DI shopping to see if we could find that perfect piece, bleached some old white sheets because I couldn't afford new ones with a duvet cover coming from Pottery Barn Kids even with a 60% off sale (originally $99 was only $42, but still!). Then we started a latch-hook wall hanging that I was dreading starting because I knew it was going to be a 20+ hour project. But it really is going to be so perfect for the space. And it's not hard work, just time consuming. I'm about 11 hours in here:

Cousin Dylan stayed overnight on Friday night. Steve and I sort of had a stay-at-home date and watched the last two episodes of the Mandalorian. It's a fun show that we both enjoy (not an easy find), but I'm not blown away by it like some seem to be. Though you really can't beat baby Yoda. Seriously. Jules and baby Yoda are kinda tied at the moment.

Saturday Steve took Dylan home and brought Cecily and Mira with him. I took Jules to the doctor because she'd been cranky for the better part of the week and I thought maybe she had an ear infection. The doctor informed me she's getting 2 molars and there's nothing else wrong with her. I guess it could be worse. So I did a little grocery shopping while we were out and then brought her home, put her down for a nap and worked on dinner and the wall hanging while binging the entire season of Blown Away on Netflix.

Today we got to have strudla at my parents' house to celebrate Haylee and James' birthdays. So yummy. And we always love getting together and debating the merits of TV shows while wrangling children and playing Heads Up.

Jules turns 1, Christmas, New Years and school/work break

My mom tells me that people are disappointed that I'm not blogging more often. I wish I was more motivated to do it every week! I feel like my life is really boring right now. Also, I think I'm slightly depressed because of no sunshine. I don't seem to get excited about much so caring whether things get done isn't something I'm doing a lot of lately.

Jules turned 1 on the 19th. We didn't do much in the way of celebrations. I took her out for Costco pizza for lunch and Steve made her cupcakes, which she seemed to like. She's been growing so fast. She's still above the 95th percentile for height. She loves "kitty"s and anything she can fit entirely inside of her mouth and crocheted dish rags. She can walk along the edge of the couch and open drawers and doors that aren't latched. She figured out last week how to climb the stairs, but has no desire to go down them. She LOVES her sisters and is happiest when she can wander around them playing. She also loves food and still makes an "mmm" noise the entire time she's eating something she likes. She is so happy and content. She makes our family better and we adore her.

The kids have been on break since the 20th. And they mostly just wanted to sit around the house. I keep asking them if they want to do something and they either say no, or we can't think of anything we can do between Jules naps.

We did go to the butterfly biosphere one day. And Steve took them to the dinosaur museum one evening.

A friend (Gina) asked me to make gingerbread houses with her one night. You know I love making gingerbread houses. And it was fun to try it on a cake plate.

Steve is forced to take the week between Christmas and New Years off, so we took advantage of the time off and finished building shelves in the garage and storage room. We got all of the boxes unpacked, too, except the ones holding decorations. I need to be motivated to sprucing up the house before those will get unpacked. As it is, I'm kind of enjoying having an uncluttered, wide open space. Plus, everything is painted just the way I like it, so it feels more homey without even putting up decorations. I do still need a buffet/table for the front entryway and an entertainment center for downstairs, but we don't currently have the money to purchase those. I often feel motivated to decorate when I have all the pieces I need, so the downstairs probably won't get worked on until I have the entertainment center.

Of course, there was Christmas. It was a great Christmas this year. I feel like we did a good job of saving and budgeting, so that even though we weren't able to purchase all the things we would have liked, we were able to purchase a lot of fun, meaningful things which made gift giving feel more special.

Cecily lost her first tooth on Christmas day. Kinda fun.

I did do one thing differently this year that I think I will continue. Usually when my mom asks me to make Christmas wish lists for the girls, I sit down and go through everything I can think of that they would want. Then I give them a toy catalog that we've gotten in the mail from Toys R Us or Funfinity. By the time we're done, we have a long list of items they would love to have. For some reason, I thought that there needed to be lots of things on their list so all the people who wanted to buy for them would have lots of ideas. But what I realized this year was that letting them ruminate over every possible thing they might want only made them unhappy when they didn't get it all. So this year, I didn't give them any ideas. I didn't let them look at catalogs or search Amazon. I simply told them to think about the things they do every day, the things they play or play with regularly and decide if there would be anything that would help them have more fun. Their lists were small, so they got most everything on them, but it also gave Steve and I the opportunity to purchase a couple of things we thought they might like but they didn't think to ask for. And that was so much more fun than stressing over how to not disappoint them because they wouldn't get all the things they had visions of in their heads.

I loved watching them be surprised and excited by the gifts they opened this year. I hope we can do this sort of thing from now on.

Then there was New Years. When Nick and Wilda lived up here, we would go to their house New Years Eve and have appetizers and play games. Since they weren't here, we decided to host our own game-playing party. We invited like 30-40 people and had six people join us. It allowed us to have two 4-player games going for most of the evening and then we all played Drawful together just before midnight. It wasn't a hopping party, but it was a perfectly fun way to ring in the new year.

I usually do New Years resolutions every year, but as I said, I'm not feeling super motivated and I've had lots of goals that I've been working toward since moving in here, so I'm boycotting them this year. Maybe by next year I'll feel a drive to look at my five-year plan and make adjustments, but this year, I'm floating down the river of I Don't Care and enjoying my cold drink and snacks. :)

The kids had a sleepover with their friend Cassie on Thursday. Which means we probably got her sick, but hopefully not. Cecily came down with her fever that night. Before we picked her up, we visited Nana who had some fun science experiments for the kids to do. We made snow and clouds in jars. The kids soak that sort of thing up.

I am still making book covers, though I'm not selling very many of them. I'm terrible at marketing. I've written four chapters in a new book that I'm excited about, which is saying something since I'm not very excitable. :) Steve is studying to take the PMP certification test. He's hoping to be ready by March. Cecily is becoming a great reader, Mira is loving having a baby sister, and Emilia is getting used to her new school and is still obsessed with all things magical girl (a type of anime/manga). She graduated primary and went to her first day of Young Women's today. And I just realized I forgot to ask what she thought of it. Mira and Cecily both came down with fevers the last two days, so they didn't get to go to church. It would have been lovely to sleep in and just hang with them, but Steve and I had committed to teaching Cecily's class at church and to giving the prayers in Sacrament meeting today.

That's life!