I guess I'll post

So John tells me with his new software that people are visiting my site even though I haven't been posting. Sorry all you people. Guilt was always a strong motivator in my life.

Anyway John writes about most of the things going on around here so I guess I don't have much to say. I help him write sometimes too, but I'll tell you what's going on here.

Tonight I went to the library's grand finale to their summer reading program. I debated whether or not to go but finally decided to because they were giving away lots of free door prizes that you could only win if you go. Anyway so I took 4 tired girls by myself, because John left today for CO for a business trip. Now for me this is a feat in itself. Anyway, so I got up there and what were they having for treats? Popsicles. I was hoping the girls wouldn't notice but the lady standing at the door saying, "Hey EVERYONE can have a popsicle!" didn't help. But remarkably the girls didn't really get any on their clothes or themselves (they did get some on the library chairs but I figure they're the ones who gave them to them, and Ruth didn't get one because she's not old enough to verbalize, "I want one!" That's why I love babies!)

So then we got to the prizes and guess what I won? A brand new Lewis and Clark commemorative edition DUTCH OVEN! I about cracked up. Now don't get me wrong, I love the dutch oven. It looks really nice and it's preseasoned and everything. But I'm sure I made quite the picture: This pregnant lady(I already look pregnant and I'm only 4 and a half months along--it's pathetic) trailing 4 little kids, one in a stroller, all ready for bed, and lugging this big box that weighs like 20-30 pounds. Couldn't I have won the restaurant gift certificate that I could have slipped in my purse? Oh well. Hopefully we'll make something really good in the dutch oven and not loan it to the scouts and never see it again like we did with our last one. The food on the box looked great. I can't wait until John gets home to try it. A guy I vaguely recognized from my days at BYU came up with his wife and offered to carry it to my car for me, but I was too embarassed to accept so I did it myself. His wife said something like, "That's all you needed--give the dutch oven to the pregnant lady with 4 little kids." We all laughed. But we made it to the car, home and into bed so I guess that's all that matters.

Vacation update

Well, we have survived. Actually we're doing great! Good food, good people, not too hot. The girls have been good. We've watched a lot shows lately because it has been raining for the past 3 days, but they're doing good.

Dave showed Kate and Mary how to play a Playstation Scooby-Doo game and they're hooked. I think this has been the first time that Kate could actually play a game by herself and have some success so she's pretty excited about it. She gives John a play by play update everyday when he calls. Hopefully he'll have some time to play with them when he comes back because I keep telling them that Dad will show them when he comes if they ask me how to do something(I'm not really a computer game person although I have played with them a little).

Ruth has decided that if she can't find her dad, Dave is a pretty good substitute. Every day when he comes home from work, she hunts him down and makes him carry her around for about an hour. It's very cute. I went up to go to bed the other night and she was talking in her sleep, saying, "Da da!" really sadly. I think she thinks we lost him. It was sad and really cute at the same time. She definitely misses him and hopefully will be glad to see him when he returns.

I had the girls pick up all their stuff all over the house today and put it back in their backpacks that we brought with us. Emma took this as a sign that we were going home and came down wearing Ruth's backpack and pulling hers and saying, "I'm ready to go!" It took a little explaining until she understood that we had a while before we were leaving and we were just cleaning up. She is having fun but she enjoyed looking at John's pictures of home tonight.

Friday we went to the children's museum. It lived up to all expectations. The girls all played happily for almost 4 hours without a single fit or breakdown. It definitely was worth the money. They dressed up and tried on the cultures of South Africa, Mexico, Vietnam, and Holland. They fished to their hearts content and then dressed like fishmongers and sold the fish to each other. They played with a giant kitchen set and picked their own food in the garden. They helped build a house and played with puppets and all kinds of games. They're already clamoring to go back. I'd have super cute pictures but as usual I forgot my camera. Bummer!(All of the above activities were plastic replicas by the way)

Anyway life is good in Buffalo. The girls are having fun and so am I.

Day 4: Visit to the Art Museum

Today we took the girls to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery here in Buffalo. Fridays it is free from 3-9pm so we decided to give it a shot. Kate has been learning lots about art in school so now she is really into art museums. She must have asked if we were going 50 times today and 50 more in the last week (we thought about going last week but it didn't work out so she's been lobbying since then). When we went to the museum she insisted that I walk around with her and read her each piece's title and artist. But all the girls enjoyed the museum today.


This museum had quite of variety of works. There was a giant jack-in-the-beanstalkesque set of giant table and chairs. We all really liked that. There also were two huge sculptures made entirely of hair. The pictures are above. The other two pictures are a couple of other sculptures from the same exhibit that the girls really liked. We definitely saw some interesting things. They had a whole gallery displaying more abstract art and the girls really liked all the bright colors. The girls' hands down favorite though was the sculpture at the end that was just for kids to climb on with live jazz music playing in the background. I guess that just goes to show that hands on is always the most popular. Anyway it was a good trip. Kate is already lobbying us to go back next week. We'll see.


The other thing that I discovered today is that Emma really needs her naps. I didn't have her lay down this afternoon because we wanted to go to the museum and it was in the middle of her naptime. But about an hour after she usually lays down, she went crazy. She went from crying hysterically about something little to running around the house chasing her sisters or bugging them and back to crying. I don't if she needs naps so she can stay calm or so I don't go crazy, but she won't be missing another one soon.

Day 2 and 3

We've been playing outside and taking naps, that pretty much covers our days. Emma said (in a slightly indignant tone), "Dad went home and he left us here!" (She's been asking to go HOME since we got here and aparently she's hurt that John didn't take her.)

Grandma has a really cool backyard with lots of toys and the girls love to play out there. There's a kitchen set and a tool bench and a little playset and some bikes. We even broke out the chalk. There's also a sand box but that's getting limited use because it requires an accompanying bath. Anyway, it has been great weather, mid 60's and I've just sat out there and read my book and let them get tired. Her backyard is also very shady at all times of the day so we haven't even gotten sunburned. It's been very nice. I'm kind of jealous of her trees.

The girls have also been working on their stitcheries for their rag quilts (obviously I haven't made them yet). Even Emma tried to do one today. She was having a little trouble but she'll get it soon enough. I bought a small light box to help me trace the designs and it has worked perfectly. It's only about 5"x9" but it's great to use while traveling. I've gotten about 3 or 4 done since I've been here. Maybe I'll get their quilts done yet. My target is 10 stitcheries per girl and I have all of Ruth and Kate's done. I'm working on Mary's and Kate and Mary are helping me. Together maybe it will all work out. My absolute final deadline is before I have the new baby which gives until December. That ought to give me plenty of time.

Pretty much everyone's gone back to work now so we have space and quiet to enforce naps. Kate and Mary don't like it much, but Emma and Ruth have been sleeping 2-3 hours each day so I guess they need the naps. I need the naps too and they always seem to end too soon, but what else is new?

Other than that our vacation is going well. We're having a good visit and eating lots of good food. We miss John but he'll be back soon, so all's well.

Day 1 alone

Today was the first day that I was alone with my girls here in Buffalo. John left this morning on an airplane to go back home and I'm staying here for 2 weeks with the girls until he comes back.
He offered to take Ruth with him so I'd only have 3 girls to watch but Ruth really isn't much of a handful--she sleeps a lot and doesn't talk back yet-- and I really want John to do some cleaning projects at our home which wouldn't get done if he had to take care of Ruth.
I haven't been feeling all that well the last few days so I was a little nervous but thankfully this morning I woke up and felt much better. I think we will have fun here. The girls love spending time with their grandparents and uncle Dave and aunt Missy and Amy may be coming back too.
Today we went out and played outside in the sandbox and then ate lunch, had naps, took baths, ate dinner, and put the girls to bed. All in all things went remarkably smoothly. The girls were good. They didn't get crazy or even complain about going to bed. Kate misses her dad and wanted to call him but he's still on a plane so I told her we could call him first thing in the morning.
It's about 8:30pm eastern and I put the girls to bed at about 7 and they're still awake but that's about normal. Hopefully they'll go to sleep soon, when it starts to get dark and I hope they don't wake up Ruth. I'm pretty sure she went to sleep right away. But life is good. It feels pretty quiet here with just us visiting now after everyone had been here, but in some ways it is nice. The girls had a little bit more normal day today and it felt pretty relaxing.

Book report: Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech

This is a great book. If you haven't read it you should. It won the 1995 Newberry Medal. It's not long but it explores some really interesting things about family life. It is about a 12-13 yr old girl who is struggling with the absence of her mother who has been gone for over a year. She moves to a new city with her dad and meets some friends at her new school who also have interesting families. You could probably read it in just a few days but it is really funny and poignant. This time when I read it I was really intrigued by all the different marriages in the book. It made me think about my own marriage and how I think of myself in relation to my husband. Anyway, it's a kid's novel but I really loved it as an adult.

Mary and soccer

Mary has decided that what she likes most about soccer is picking the grass and playing in the dirt while she watches every one else play. Now this is OK because really she's a little slower than the big 6 year old boys that constantly hog the ball so she has a little bit of a hard time keeping up. She tries for a while and then gets down to the business of landscaping. But Saturday she took soccer to a whole new level. She was being a defender with another little boy and so she was standing by the goal waiting for the ball to come back when all of a sudden we see her lifting up her shirt and showing the boy her tummy. He lifts up his shirt and shows his stomach, and the coach (the little boy's dad) comes running over and says, "Hey, what's going on here? Watch the game!!" What was really happening was that Mary had secretly worn her swimsuit to the game and was trying to show the little boy what a cool swimsuit she had on. I told John, "Go over there and tell your daughter to keep her clothes on!" He did and she did but we all had a good laugh.

Kate's kindergarten evaluation

This past Tuesday morning was Kate's spring evaluation. John and I went and she showed us all the things she has been doing and learning in school. She reads, she writes, she does math. She is a super smart girl. She meets all the grade standards so John told her she doesn't have to go to school anymore. I overruled however, so she still has another month. She is way smart and it was fun to see some of the things she's been learning. It was especially fun for John to see all the things she knows ( I volunteer once a week so I pretty much know). She was beaming when her teacher came up and said how smart she was and how well she was doing at writing. It made her feel good. And we were glad to know that she's doing so well.

Emma's new complaint

Emma's new complaint is that "______ is not being nice."(you put in the name) The funny thing is that what it really means is that someone is not letting her do whatever she wants. For instance, she goes up to Mary after Mary has been sitting in the same chair for at least a half an hour watching a show, and she says something like, "Mary I want to sit there. I was sitting there first. Move." And Mary responds, "No!!! You weren't sitting here first I was. Leave me alone." After a small verbal battle involving lots of Yahuhs and Nuhuhs, Emma runs to my bedroom or wherever I may be and says, "Mom, Mary's not being nice."(with her lip sticking out a mile) She really does make me laugh. Once I figured out her code, I was able to more easily mediate fights. (Mostly I just say, I'm sorry, anyway. I usually try not to get involved.)

Another example was tonight at dinner. We had asked the girls not to play, just to eat because we were trying to get them to bed before John had to go to his meeting. Anyway, Emma was still trying to play with Mary, and Mary was trying to be good so she was ignoring Emma. Anyway she was making Emma mad, so Emma turns to me and says, "Mom, Mary's not being nice." I say, " Mary's just doing what we asked her to do, now turn around and eat." So Emma again tries to play with Mary and gets ignored again. She turns to me and says, "Mom, Mary hit me." Now keep in mind, I'm sitting right next to Mary and watching both of them because the whole thing is so funny. Mary hasn't even looked at Emma, let alone hit her. I started laughing and said, "Mary did not hit you, now eat your dinner." She seemed to be a little disappointed that Mary wasn't going to get in trouble and she wouldn't be able to play with her food, but she stopped bugging Mary. Emma definitely is my comic relief in life.

Ruth--daddy's girl

Ever since Ruth came back from Maryland she has definitely been a daddy's girl. She'll take me if there is noone else but if John is around then she wants him. If he walks by her without picking her up she is heartbroken. For the first couple of days after he got back, when he was getting ready to leave for work, she would give him this look like, "After all we've meant to each other, you're not taking me with you." Frankly, I think it is super funny. It's kind of nice to not be the one who has to calm down a screaming baby. Ruth just learned to shake her head for "no" when she doesn't want something. So when John's holding her, if I go up and stretch my arms out to her she shakes her head vigorously, pushes me away and then looks the other way to pretend I'm not there. And if John actually hands her to me (like before he has to go to work in the morning) she screams bloody murder until he is out of the room. Again, it cracks me up. Obviously, there was some serious bonding in Maryland. And I think it is good for John's ego. At least he knows someone loves him. Someone else, I mean.