last few days of January

On Sunday, Dode was gone for a few hours home teaching and I was here with the kids.  Right about the time I decided to start making dinner, Luke made his way downstairs for a nap.  I cuddled him in and he fell back asleep.  When Dode got home an hour later, I was still sitting with Luke in my arms.  I told him I was sorry there was no dinner made and he told me that there were many many more dinners to be made but not very many times to cuddle with my little boy.  I’m glad we were on the same page because I was fully enjoying holding my little boy.

I belong to a Facebook group called Buy Nothing.  It is a worldwide movement where you join a group where you live.  The goal of the group is to get rid of things you no longer want and to ask for things you need.  When the groups grow beyond 1,000 people, they split the group.  The Arlington group was up around 1,500 and this weekend was when the split happened.  I have enjoyed lending things out and expressed sadness to one of the administrators that I’d no longer be able to help as many people.  She checked with the regional administrators who said that if I was an administrator in my group, I could be a member in the other Arlington group for the sole purpose of lending out my things.  Each group generally has three administrators and I was coming on as the fourth one.  I was planning on being an administrator in name only.  Well, as soon as I was announced as a fourth admin, one of the other administrators said her life was really busy and she needed to quit.  I don’t think being an administrator will be too big of a deal, there are three of us approving new member requests, dealing with questions that come up and posting encouraging things on the group page.  Since I love lending stuff, my focus is the lending library.  I’ve got several posts pending about the library to invite people to use it and to add to it.

When we finally had time last fall to work on getting firewood split, we learned that a seal on the wood splitter was leaking and could no longer hold hydraulic fluid.  Dode thought we had enough dry wood to make it through the winter, and any wood we split this winter won’t be ready to burn until next year, so getting it repaired wasn’t a priority.  I wanted it fixed because I know that summer will be just as busy this year and we have wood sitting on the ground needing split both here at our house and out at my mom’s.  The repairs on the splitter were beyond something Dode and his dad could do.  Dode took the cylinder needing repaired into a shop and they wanted $250 to replace the seal.  Dode said, “No thank you” and was on his way.  I said, “But if we have to heat with electricity, the bill will be at least that much for one month.”  Dode held his ground and refused to pay the $250 for the repair.  He ended up buying a brand new cylinder off ebay for about the same price as just getting the seal replaced on the old one.  The bonus of buying a new one is we have an entirely new cylinder, not a repaired rusty pitted cylinder that would likely break down again.  In the middle of deciding what to do with the wood splitter, we had another family who was running low on wood ask if they could use the splitter.  That really lit a fire under me.  Because life can never be too easy, the new part has to be modified to work on the splitter.  Dode has it almost ready to go, it just needs some welding and it will be ready to go.  Hopefully that last task will happen this week. 

At the end of last summer, Dode was asked to be in charge of a pioneer reenactment for the youth in our local church area called Trek.  He spent many many hours researching where to go, walking and biking trails in the nearby tree farm, by himself and with both Elizabeth and William.  His responsibilities don’t just include route finding, but all the planning that goes into making the trek happen.  The couple who are in charge of training the adult leaders (youth are organized into families with a ma and pa) have been on 7 treks but some of the adults have never participated in one, as a youth or an adult.  The trainers wanted to have access to a handcart at their training to show the leaders what they’d be working with.  Dode’s grandparents have a handcart that has been sitting in their yard as a lawn ornament since a trek Dode did as a youth almost 30 years ago.  The wooden body of the handcart had been filled with dirt and used as a planter.  After 30 years of Washington weather, there wasn’t much wood left.  When Dode asked his dad if he could borrow it for the training, his dad said he wasn’t sure how much there was left to it.  A week later he called Dode over to look at something on the cart and he’d completely rebuilt the wooden body and it was ready to go. 

Wednesday was the twins 4^th birthday.  We started the day with their well child check ups at the doctor.  They both are growing fine, following their curve somewhere between the 20-25%.  We met my mom at the Children’s Museum in Everett after the doctor visit.  Once again, the twins and Finnley mostly went their separate ways.  At the end of our last visit, my mom told Leah that when we came back for her birthday, she could get a toy from the gift shop.  She’d decided then that she wanted a pink pony she saw on the shelf.  When we got done playing on their birthday, when everyone was complaining they were hungry, we visited the gift shop.  Leah remembered and pointed right to that pink horse, she didn’t even want to look around at what else was available.  Luke picked out some trains.  We had lunch at a teriyaki restaurant a block from the museum and headed home.  The twins fell asleep on the way home so I left them in the car and kept checking on them every few minutes.  I had just enough time to make their birthday cake before we had to leave again.  Well, as time got short, I wasn’t able to check on them as often.  I looked out the window to see Luke just waking up, so I went upstairs to get Elizabeth for twin help.  By the time we made it to the car, they were both awake and hysterical.  Even when they got their feelings under control, every now and then Leah would start howling again, “you left us in the car!”  I picked up Miriam and William from school and we drove over to the chiropractor.  We go once a month and adjustments are free on a birthday so I got to get the twins adjusted for free!  After the chiropractor, we went across the street to see Isaac at the insurance agency he just started working for.  It was my first time meeting his boss.  I’m sure he was glad when we left and the office was nice and peaceful again!

On Thursday, when Elizabeth and I got done at the class we attend at the YMCA, we took the twins swimming for an hour.  I was worried we’d be stuck in the pool forever since the last time we took them almost two hours wasn’t long enough.  This time, we could play in the kiddie area for 30 minutes and then it closed and we had to use the larger pool.  I think because they were submerged, they got cold and after another 30 minutes, they were ready to go home.  I felt like a good mom for taking them to do something that I really don’t enjoy.

On Friday, my mom and I went to an event in town called the Country Charm Walk.  We picked up an empty bracelet from the chamber of commerce and then we walked from business to business, picking up a bead for our bracelet at each place.  It was a nice relaxing day.  We stopped part way through to have lunch together and were gone from home for about two hours.  That night, my mom treated us to tickets to see the play Newsies in Everett.  She saw it a week before and said that in all the plays she’s seen over the years (a season ticket holder at the 5^th Avenue in Seattle for many many years), this play was one of her favorites.  After her experience, she bought four tickets so that I, Elizabeth, Miriam and Jacob could go.  Unfortunately, right before we were going to go, Jacob came down with a stomach bug.  With less than an hour’s notice, Sharon was able to go with us.  The play was really good, the music was excellent and the dancing was amazing. 

On Saturday, we took the kids to the Eagle Festival in town for the first time.  I thought they’d like it since there are many activities for kids like a petting zoo, crafts, chainsaw art, rocks and gemstone displays.  Well, it was a complete bust.  Once we told Leah she couldn’t have kettle corn, that was all we heard about.  Over and over, “I want popcorn!”  The animals were scary, they didn’t want to do crafts, the chainsaws were too noisy, they had no interest in the rocks and gemstones. 

4th week of January

The absolute highlight of my week was our family party on Saturday to celebrate the five January birthdays, Dorrel (1/3), Jacob,(1/5), Anastaya (1/26), Luke and Leah (1/31). Anastaya showed up around 2:00. Jacob got home from work around 4:00 and a few minutes later Isaac and Natalie showed up. My heart was so full to have all my children together under the same roof. I realized that I must be getting old and maybe turning into a grandma type person if that is the highlight of my week! At the end of the night, Elizabeth told me that I seemed really really happy, she was correct!

At dinner, we went around the table sharing some memories of Anastaya. I'm going to record them here.  Elizabeth talked about how gullible Anastaya is. She just doesn't have the sarcasm gene. I once bought a book called, “How to know if your cat is trying to kill you.” Anastaya asked me if the book was true and I said yes. Well, she believed me and realized that our cats were trying to kill us because they hang out on the stairs. William shared memories of tubing behind the boat with Anastaya, singing songs that required them to clap and let go of the tube handles. My mom shared a memory of the first time we went to Ocean Shores with Anastaya for spring break. Anastaya and William had only been in our home for about a week. She jumped into the hotel pool and didn't know how to paddle her arms to move around in the water. She was so determined to swim like the other kids that by the time we left three days later, she was getting herself all around that pool. Jacob: I shared about the time she spoke at her high school graduation ceremony at the Comcast Arena in front of a huge crowd. She sounded assured and confident as she co-conducted the ceremony since she was in senior class office. She'd had bunion surgery just a few days before and was using a knee scooter for the first time. As she was going down the wheelchair ramp after she was done, she picked up a lot of speed and it seemed like she took the 180 degree turn on the ramp on two wheels. The curtains behind her were moving with the wind she was creating. I thought she was just so glad to be finished. It turns out, the breaks on the knee scooter weren't hooked up right. Some people sitting next to us commented that they were sure she was going to crash and the classmates sitting around her commented on the curtains moving. Miriam also shared how fun she made tubing behind the boat. Greg shared that he remembered her learning to play the piano and how hard it was for her to do but how proud of her he is for sticking with it until piano went from a chore to a joy. Isaac shared about what a crazy skier she was, going straight down the hill without taking any turns just to beat him to the bottom, with other skiers diving out of her way as she flew down the mountain. He also shared about how many things they learned at the same time, like learning to drive, and getting their wisdom teeth out at the same time. He remembers how happy he was when they woke up from surgery, wanting to fist bump her, while she was completely grumpy and blamed everything on him.

Dode broke his second tooth in two weeks this week. Neither time was he eating something hard or crunchy, it was just time I guess. Both areas are on a molar where there is a large filling in the middle. One of the corners of two molars just broke off. The dentist told us that the insurance probably won't pay for crowns. The insurance will only pay for two "emergency" evaluations a year.  With this second tooth getting broken, he will be out of evaluations for the year.  Hopefully no more break!  I told Dode apparently he's out of warranty now that he's turned 47.  

I made my exercise goal at the YMCA this week, getting in my 12 sessions.  Each month, the Y does a promotion to inspire people to work out more.  I usually try to participate.  If you complete 12 workouts in January, you get entered to win a 3 month membership.  For me, it's not the prize that's motivating, it's just completing the challenge.  With it being January, everyone is gung ho on their exercise goals and the classes are so full and hard to get into. If you aren't standing outside 15 minutes before class, waiting for the prior class to get out, you risk not getting any equipment when it's time for your class to start. It can be so hard to be a patient mom when it takes me extra long to get from the parking lot to the child watch and then down to the line for class, knowing that with each delay I might miss my spot in class. The kids always want their coats on, zipped up to the top, hats on, then a backpack or a bag of toys they'll just set in a cubby at child watch. There is also a part of sidewalk where they always have to “practice their balance” by walking on it like a balance beam. It takes forever but I dig deep and don't get short tempered with them.

I went visiting teaching on Friday to a friend who is the same age as me. Her kids are either out of the house or in high school. As we were talking, she mentioned that she couldn't imagine being in my situation, parenting four year olds. I thought about that later. I feel like I am in the prime of life right now. While raising little people always has its minor irritations and sacrifices (like getting into a store from the parking lot in a timely manner, pooped underwear from a reluctant potty trainer, or kids swan diving onto my bed at night when I just want to go to sleep), I completely believe that in 10 years, I will look back and say, “Those were the days, we were really living”. It is such an amazing thing to watch little people learn to navigate their world. To see them learn new things you don't even remember teaching them, to get to play and re-read treasured children's books.   We've been reading Pinkalicious and the Pink Drink a lot this week.  It's about a little girl who has a lemonade stand selling pink lemonade and cupcakes.  The twins wanted their own stand so Dode built them one for inside use.

Getting two little people to look at the camera is no joke!  The cupcakes below started out with frosting and sprinkles on top but Luke ate all the tops off!

We try to read the scriptures with the kids each night.  One night this week, as the twins saw we were gathering, they each grabbed a set of scriptures and got ready.  They wanted to "read" too.

On Saturday, Brent asked us to watch his step-son Nathan (11) for the day.  I decided to make it a cousin play day so Seth (10) and Ellie (8) came over to play too.  At one point, they were all outside playing and I told Dode it sounded like an elementary school recess out there, perfection!

This week I achieved a milestone of sorts.  The twins had their 4 year old evaluation at WIC.  Children are eligible for WIC until they turn 5 so this will be their last year on the program.  I had my first WIC evaluation when I was pregnant with Jacob, almost 26 years ago.  There have been so many changes in the program over the years.  I used to have to drive to Everett every month to pick up checks.  I had to sign each one individually and I had to let them know ahead of time what store I would be using them at.  Now, checks can be given for three months at a time, I only sign a stub for each month (one signature instead of four), they used at any participating store,  and WIC has an office in Arlington.  The foods have also changed over the years, with less juice offered and the addition of being able to get fresh fruits and vegetables.  You can also now get whole wheat bread.  They just started offering yogurt in place of some of the milk.  Last year the cereal we'd been choosing with our WIC checks, Life, was no longer eligible.  After 25 years?!  We had to switch to Chex.  When I talked to Dode during our daily lunch break phone call, I told him about my milestone.  He told me it made him feel like a pretty lousy provider.  He makes a decent wage but when you divide it up among the number of people in our family, that makes us low income according to the federal government.

3rd week of January

Monday was Martin Luther King Jr day so the kids and Dode were home. We asked the kids what they wanted to do as a family activity and they chose swimming. I looked at the Lynwood pool and the Snohomish pool which both have water slides and a play area for the little ones. Both places only had swimming available during nap time. We decided to go the YMCA.  There are no waterslides but there is a nice play area for the twins and a lazy river for the bigger kids. We swam for almost 2 hours, which I thought was plenty of time but the kids thought was too short.  When I got our membership last year, I bought the cheaper family package that only included one adult membership because I knew Dode wouldn't be working out.  He can come as our guest three times in a calendar year.  I figured that would give us three family swimming trips.  He came once last year with us, that's how much we dread and put off taking the family swimming.  It's such a hassle to get dressed and undressed, it's always a bit cold, it's pretty boring for us old folks.  When I joined the Y, I'd told myself I'd take the kids swimming once a month.  We went swimming in January, February and March.  In April we went to Ocean Shores during spring break so I decided that counted as our monthly swimming and with that I broke the cycle and I never took the twins swimming again!  Twice a week when we visit the Y for my workouts, we walk right next to the pool with it's big windows and I told myself that if I took them once, they'd want to swim every time.  It was pretty easy to talk myself out of it.  Well, it's a new year with new goals.  We went swimming on MLK day and I already promised the twins we'd go swimming the day after their birthday.  Twice in January!

On Wednesday, we met my mom at the Everett Children's Museum in the morning. Thankfully Elizabeth came because my mom had Finnley and I had the twins and they had very different interests. Although they were all at the museum at the same time, they spent most of their time playing in different areas. For Luke, his favorite area was the trains, both an extensive Thomas the Tank Engine set and a model electric train. Leah loved playing inside the kid sized airplane. Finnley enjoyed playing with the air filled tubes that will lift a ball up into a maze of tubes in the ceiling before dropping them back down to play with again.  They all spent some part of their time in the water play area.  After playing, we had a delicious teriyaki lunch.

In the fall I sent a DNA sample off to Ancestry.com which allows you to find relatives through DNA. Well, a few weeks ago, I received a message from my dad's first cousin that neither one of us have ever met. She's 76 years old and lives about an hour south of the Canadian border in New York State.  When we were emailing back to forth, it was in the 50's here and raining while it was minus 32 where she lived with 8" of snow on the ground.  I have been thrilled with the results of my DNA test verifying on several sides of my family that I have built an accurate family tree. My dad's cousin wasn't able to give me any additional information about their shared grandparents who immigrated from Czechoslovakia but she is sending me some photos of them. I'm so excited!  Another exciting thing she shared is that her mother lived to 102 and her uncle into his 90's.  My grandfather on my dad's side died in his early 60's, I thought I was short lived genes.  Maybe there's hope!

I usually hand toys on when the older kids had outgrown them (we thought we were done with kids) but there are three things I've saved over the years, the play kitchen, Thomas the Tank Engine set and the dollhouse equipment.  We first got the dollhouse when Elizabeth was little, and we've added on to it with both Miriam and Leah.  The big dollhouse is still stored out in the barn (you'll see Luke's fire station "dollhouse" in the photo above) but I brought in a small tub of the furniture as well as a mom, dad, sister and three babies this week and the twins have been really enjoying setting up little scenarios and acting out parts of life. Their favorite thing to do is make the dolls and babies use the toilet.

Toileting is a big part of their life.  Leah is fully potty trained and runs to the toilet multiple times a day.  Luke is a more reluctant potty trainer.  If I have him in underwear or a swimming diaper, he will pee in the toilet on his own volition 80% of the time.  If he is in a diaper or pull up, he never decides to use the toilet.  As to pooping, we have a zero success rate.  I've tried everything with him.  He uses a stool softener every day to keep things moving.  He gets a lollipop if he uses the toilet but that didn't seem to be motivating him to use the toilet for #2.  I bought matchbox cars for him to receive if he poops in the toilet.  He knows what they're for and he knows he can't have them until he poops.  He will sometimes take them out of the cupboard and look at them in their package but he still won't poop in the toilet. 

On the health front: Dode broke a tooth this week.  He was just sitting at dinner eating ham tetrazini when he pulled a piece of his tooth out of his mouth.  When he'd felt it in his mouth, he first thought it was a piece of gristle, nope, it was a piece of him!  He doesn't have any pain, just a jagged tooth.

Luke had his yearly IEP meeting for speech this week.  After attending preschool twice a week with 20 minutes of speech therapy a week, he hasn't made much progress.  The speech teacher wants him to receive speech services twice a week, once for 20 minutes with another student, the other for 30 minutes of one on one time.  She also wants me to make a photo book with pictures of his family and things that are important to him that he can keep in his backpack.  When he's trying to talk with his teachers, if they don't understand what he's trying to tell them, he can use a photo to help.

On Saturday, Miriam and Dode had a Miriam/dad day.  It was really hard to come up with something for them to do in the winter.  While it seems on the surface that Miriam is up for anything, when you think through the things you could do, a lot of them don't seem practical.  They ended up going to the Museum of Flight in Seattle.  The kids have free memberships through an educational program that allows them to bring a parent with them for free.  Although we've had the free memberships for several years, this is the first time we've taken advantage of them.  We've taken little people to the museum so many times and it's really not a relaxing time.  We've kind of given up on it!  Dode was worried that Miriam would spend a few minutes at the museum, flying through the museum, and be bored.  They spent hours there and she really seemed to enjoy it.  After the museum, they went out to pizza before coming home.  Miriam is in a stage of life, middle school angst, where she just can't seem to fill her reservoir of meaningful parent interaction.  Each night when we head to bed, she wants to lay in bed with us and cuddle and talk.  Unfortunately for her, the twins are always there too, interrupting her, bumping into her as they climb around the bed, taking all the fun out of it for her.  We need to be more proactive about getting her some parent time.

2nd week of January

The second week of January felt really low key. Dode didn't have any church responsibilities at all! The kids didn't have youth night at church either. To take advantage of that open youth night, we had Sharon and Lynn and great grandma over for dinner. After dinner we put Lynn to work recording the narration for the laser maze Dode is working on for the church talent show.

I think this will be the third year of the talent show. The talent show has both performing talents and display talents.  The first year, we did a funny family skit about a pretend enlarging machine and Dode built a floor piano that Anastaya and a friend performed on. Last year, we brought the floor piano as a display talent and set it out for the kids to play on, as well as our secret combination box where when they solve the combination, they can take a token they can use to get candy from our candy machine. This year, Dode decided he wanted to try his hand at building a laser maze. I teased about it on the ward Facebook page as a display talent with ping pong balls, toilet paper tubes and Bionicle pieces. So far, he's experimented with lasers and found that he needs to use green lasers since they're more visible than red lasers. He's repurposed a tap light to be the button the kids will push at the end to turn off the lasers. He's also built a count down clock. The kids will have 40 seconds to make it through the maze. He wanted a quick narration to set the stage for the kids. Lynn has a very deep voice that worked perfectly. Great Grandma Dickson was in the room when he was recording and she kept giggling and laughing at him. It was so sweet!

Wednesday was early release for the Arlington School District. I try to do something fun with the kids each early release but this year is a bit of a challenge because there is an early release day each month! When I asked the kids what they wanted to do, Miriam really wanted to go get frozen yogurt. That was an easy activity! While the twins and Finnley were sleeping, we headed over to frozen yogurt. It was waffle Wednesday which meant you could get a waffle bowl for free. Score!

Thursday after dinner, Miriam and I had some one on one time. We visited the four little free libraries in Arlington. A little free library is a small display that people put in their front yard with books in it. The idea is you can grab a book and leave one behind. We visited four libraries and Miriam never found any books she wanted. She enjoyed the time with just mom so she could vent about all the stresses of middle school life.

I made it to the YMCA four times this week so I'm half way to the goal of 12 visits in January. I did TRX on Monday, strength training on Tuesday and Friday and yoga on Thursday. They have free child care at the Y that is divided into “child watch” and “adventure zone”. You have to be 3 and potty trained to go to the adventure zone. Leah is potty trained but Luke and Finnley aren't. Since it was just Leah going with me on Thursday and Friday, she got to go to the adventure zone. She thought she was a pretty big girl! Maybe it will encourage Luke to start using the toilet?

This weekend is a produce weekend. I can't believe I've been doing produce for over 8 years! Every other Saturday, Dode and I get up in the middle of the night to meet the semi truck at the end of the driveway and transfer about a ton of produce from a pallet to our trailer. Semis won't fit up our driveway so this is how we have to do it. For years, they've told me that they don't send the smaller trucks that would fit up our driveway as far north as we are. Well, every time I'm driving around on a Friday afternoon and see one of the smaller trucks in my area, I'm just a little bit peeved. I've asked for our delivery time and truck to be changed but the company said that's not an option.