yesterday

Yesterday, I:

• Folded two loads of laundry
• Read Jacob 5 (and had lots of insightful moments) (before getting on Facebook ;-)
• Exercised for an hour
• Ate a 730-calorie homemade breakfast, but made up for it with a super healthy FANTASTIC dinner
• Physically carried 31 cases of recently ordered, newly delivered food storage from our front porch to our living room
• Created a Word food storage inventory document
• Played Candyland
• Read Dr. Seuss
• Took the kids on a late-night Fred Meyer run (to let Dad take a much needed nap) wherein I bribed them into good behavior with the impulse buys of chocolate milk and cinnamon croissants
• Researched our next fun family adventure to Great Wolf Lodge
• Got to bed by 10 PM. Awesome.

tooth fairy

Wesley lost his first tooth this month. Eek. From the time of "look mom it's loose!" (February 16) to "ahh! mom! my tooth came out!" (March 7) was less than a month. My little dude is growing up. He says it "didn't even hurt" but for me, golly there was a lot of gore. I held it together, thank goodness.

I made this little number during the Bachelor finale a few weeks ago. It was so quick, I finished it before the show was even over. Had an hour to spare.

The little tooth is made of fleece, with the eyes and mouth felt. It's stuffed with whatever I had a coupon for from JoAnn Fabrics. I think it turned out well :-)  I hope the eyes and mouth stay on for the duration of Wesley's tooth-losing days. Only time will tell. 

The "tooth fairy" came while Wesley was eating breakfast one morning. I told him to check his pillow, and sure enough there was a gold $1 Sacajawea coin. He doesn't really understand money, so I was trying to tell him we could go to the dollar store and he could pick out whatever he wanted (his obsession is mylar balloons, so he would probably get one of those). He seemed to think that was great, but then a day or so later he was "playing" with his money and lost it. I'm sure it's here somewhere. Or maybe it's in his floor register for the heat.... he likes to stick things down there. 

It's been cute to watch him talk with no tooth down there. I miss his old face but love his new face! I can't believe his little smile will continue to change. Love that kid.

some 2014 videos

TWO posts today.... you lucky folks. I decided to see if Laurel would sing the "happy song" for you guys and she did. It's so cute. Plus here are some other awesome videos from the last few months. My favorite is probably the microwave... hilarious!!

photo shoot

I never posted these and I'm sad! They're to die for.

We took them at about the turn of the year, as Laurel's 2-year photos. Wesley photobombed a few of them. There's something about Grandma Gottula's camera that makes his eyes SO BLUE. Awesome.

 

 

Cute kids. I love them. 

ducks in the pond quack a happy (birthday) song

Laurel has this primary song she LOVES. I had never heard it before, but she sung it enough (and I helped in nursery enough) that I found it online and we have learned it. Of course, it's adorable. Anyway, after some big storms in the last week or two our family has been particularly interested in our neighboring retaining pond, since if it overflows the water runs to our house (and our crawl space) and my husband freaks out. Well, in checking out the pond one day we learned there are ducks that live there! Laurel saw them, and said, "Mommy! Ducks in the pond!" And I realized she was saying the lyrics to the song...

Ducks in the pond quack a happy song
Mother hen cackles the whole day long
Birds in the nest and wind in the treetops
All join in singing a happy song.

It's ah-dorable.

So. We had some stale bread in the freezer that I should have thrown out long ago -- and boom! Bread for ducks! We thawed it and tried to feed them. She can't really feed them, since there's a huge fence there, so for one, I sorta have to hurl the bread pieces over the fence and hope they land in the water. And two, six to eight ducks hang out in the pond but they like to swim on the FAR side. The first time we went none of them came close enough to eat any bread. Luckily, once last week two of the ducks swam close enough to see the food we provided. The one with the green head, he's the prettiest and by far the smartest. He always comes over now when we're there.

These were taken last week... 3/13... you can totally see them eating our bread.

WELL, this MORNING, we had another friend over for Wesley and we were all playing in the backyard during a light drizzle, and I'm talking to the kids and such, and VOILA, the ducks appeared on our fence. I really think that green duck KNOWS MY VOICE or something.

Then they hopped down INTO our yard...

Yes, the thought crossed my mind to run into the house and get the bread and feed them, but I decided against it. I already know that green one is a smart duck. If I gave him bread, they'd probably move into our backyard and I don't think we WANT that necessarily. So we just watched them.

Eventually Laurel chased them :-)  You can see his beak open "quacking" in some of these photos. Hilarious!!

And then he's off!

What a funny morning!!!!!

In other news, St. Paddy's Day was a huge success because 1) all of us wore green, 2) we had green eggs and ham, and 3) it was Shane's 36th birthday! Awesome!

I got him a cool remote control helicopter (a nice one from a hobbyist store) to replace the cheap-o one he bought himself at Christmas that has since died. The kids each picked two things from the dollar store -- a fun activity. Laurel picked a 7-pack of sponges which she was CONVINCED Shane needed. (The kids helped him wash his car last week so I think she thinks he needs more sponges to wash his car?) Laurel picked out a cup, and Wesley got some towels (also for car washing) and a 6-pack of small Kleenex packages with the Planes characters on them. Awesome.

The birthday boy requested pie instead of a cake, so I made apple pie yesterday morning. He was thrilled and said it was really good :-) We also used trick candles so they kept re-lighting. Wesley had a hard time with that and kept telling Shane to blow harder. Then he sorta got serious and was worried he wouldn't be able to eat pie because Dad couldn't blow the candles out. We need to work on helping that kid have a sense of humor.

He and I got a sitter and went out to eat at a Thai place for dinner, and it was fun!!! We had like, a nice conversation and no one climbed on us. A great birthday outing.

I am not sure I'm ready to tell Wesley he's "next" when it comes to family birthdays... I think he'll milk that for all it's worth.

March is great! Love it!

yesterday

Yesterday, I:

• Read my scriptures before getting on Facebook (two Isaiah chapers, take that!)
• Picked up (with the kids' help) the tornado that was our playroom
• Vaccuumed my entire house (including stairs)
• Swept my entire house
• Had a 45-minute impromptu playdate with a neighbor, where the girls played in the sun outside with chalk on the sidewalks
• MOPPED my entire house (yay!)
• Listened to three Bachelor-related podcasts (haha)
• Attempted to feed the ducks in our retaining pond but instead scared them off
• Collected information for doing our taxes
• Washed my car
• Ate too many Trader Joe's mini mega chocolate chip cookies
• Painted my fingernails & toenails
• Clothed, fed, entertained, bathed, and read to both kids
• Finished a book (My Story by Elizabeth Smart.... eerie and yet hopeful)

Woo hoo! Almost perfect day. 

march resolutions

I'm starting my New Years' Resolutions in March. Here goes...

1. Read my scriptures every day BEFORE checking Facebook. This is BIG. (My goal is to read the whole Book of Mormon this year.)

2. Make exercise a priority and lose 5 lbs each month for like, the next many months. I have not been in control for the past several months and this needs to change like NOW. I'm going to track the calories I consume on MyFitnessPal and I am planning on success. I know what to do and I have the right tools, I just have to persuade myself to be strong.

3.  Pray every morning and evening that I can be patient with my children and that I can more love my husband. This family relationship is important and needs nurturing.

These are the big ones. Here goes nothing.