on a softly lit morning

this morning, my girls woke up early. but it was okay, because i had been up earlier.

we went back to my bed and curled up on the mattress pad (the sheets were already in the washer). diane had a feast of her fish mobile while madeleine adorned her with mardi gras beads. then, madeleine snuggled up next to me (she is so good at that) and chattered away until her words gradually turned into made-up songs. as they often do. i became diane's jungle-gym and the moment was complete.

motherhood surrounded and enveloped me.

i bottled up the moment tightly and put in on a shelf in my mind. i will pull it out on days when they are growing up too fast.

wrapping up summer

 

it seems that summer is finally coming to a close. even though we still have hot days, they are different. they start with crisp mornings and end with cool evenings. it is the period of limbo where you never know what outfit to wear in the morning because it might be inappropriate by afternoon.

this was such a great summer. one of my favorites ever. it was a summer of having randy home more often. a much needed randy refill after his recital prep and execution. it was a summer of amazing family vacations with both sides of the family and really rich memories from those trips. it was the summer of daily walks with the girls, rolling around in the grass, and spending lots of time in the backyard. it was a summer of gardening, yardwork, and food preservation. it was a summer of running around in airy skirts and flip-flops and just feeling lighter in general. it was a really awesome summer. i'm a little sad to see it go, but excited for fall and winter and all that they bring. randy is dying to go to a cornmaze with the girls, and madeleine can't stop talking about pumpkins or her birthday. some things are coming sooner than others.

here are some pictures from our last couple weeks of summer. nothing really tying them together, just wrapping up loose ends. a typical picture-heavy post from me.

 

we lived on this quilt this summer

a nice tantrum shot

do you like how i caught that drool on camera mid-drip?

madeleine's not going to know what to do with herself once she can't spend all afternoon outside

 

diane had fallen asleep in her highchair and i went to take a picture, but she finally literally nodded off  and hit her head on the tray. she was kind of sad. poor thing was very tired.

nice recovery

a little dazed and disoriented.

 

we got a quick little visit from my niece last week during a last minute trip to utah. madeleine was elated to spend the morning with lainey and the two were inseparable.  i wish we lived closer to them.

 

and to usher in fall...

 rah. rah. rah, rah, rah. 

   rah. rah. rah, rah, rah.   

rah. rah. rah, rah, rah.

goooooo, cougars!

(they're going to need all the help they can get this season)

downpour

after we finished the business of balloon buying and sent daddy off to class this morning, we got back into the car. and that's when it started raining. not just any rain though. it was percussive rain. the kind that smacks your windshield and often yields to thunder and sometimes even hail. it did both today.

i felt bad for the perfectly coifed girl who didn't know she had forgotten her umbrella until she was suddenly drenched. and i almost felt bad for the boy in the white shorts who was riding a scooter. but he wasn't wearing a helmet, so i had a hard time feeling sympathy.

we drove down university and left the storm behind us. apparently moving slower than 50 mph.

it followed me home and made rivers out of the gutters. i love a good rainstorm.

madeleine sings

some more videos for jeanie. once again, excuse any bad cinematography. i was trying to juggle diane and film at the same time.

these are the words to the song she's singing: 

You give me a kiss.
You give me a hug.
You smile when you see me too.
I wish ev’ry child in the whole wide world
Had a grandmother just like you.

You read me a book.
You sing me a song.
You whisper you love me too.

I wish ev’ry child in the whole wide world
Had a grandmother just like you.

I’ll try to be good;
I’ll do as I should.
I’ll whisper, “I love you too.”

I wish ev’ry child in the whole wide world
Had a grandmother just like you.

this one's for grandpa bob. she also likes to sing it with pa'a.

lyrics:

it's always fun when grandpa bob comes, when grandpa bob comes, hooray!

he always says the kindest things, and in the kindest way

he has a wrinkly, twinkly smile, he's happy all the day

it's always fun for everyone when grandpa bob comes

twinkle, twinkle:

the wise man and the foolish man:

for british eyes only

these are some videos of diane, as per grandmother request (and who can blame her?). they're really not anything thrilling, just some of her moving around and being suddenly grown up. i understand if you're not interested, but they're fun for seeing her progress.

also, excuse the blurry cinematography. she just loves coming right up to the camera.

to stitch, or not to stitch?

pale mom and sad girl

last night, we had our first "do we take her to the hospital, or not?" situation. right before bed, madeleine was running over to read a book on my bed and tripped right into the corner of our metal bed frame. as i saw her falling, i knew that there would be tears, but i wasn't prepared for the stream of blood when i picked her up. although i often pale at the mere sight of blood, it wasn't until we cleaned up the blood and i saw how deep the wound was that i really felt like passing out. i can do spiders, snakes, and other scary things, but i don't do well with gore.

fortunately, randy was home (can i say how happy i am that he was home?) and he is extremely good with blood, wounds, etc. and went right to work. we decided (with the help of some pictures and texting with my dad) that although the wound was deep, it was small and a clean cut and all it needed was a good cleaning and some steri strips. while i held madeleine and comforted her, randy ran to the store for supplies.

all bandaged up

madeleine was brave through the whole process, although she was obviously shaken by the whole thing. after some doctoring and a little einsteins episode, she went to bed and, thankfully, slept through the night. she did wake up crying this morning about her owie hurting. for the most part though, she seems just fine. randy will have to change the dressing again when he gets home tonight.

this whole experience made me appreciate our friend, dave badger, even more than i already did. dave is a family friend who is also an excellent surgeon. on several occasions (many involving me), dave got a call from my dad asking if he could bring a kid by to check if something needed more serious medical attention. dave was always a great sport and never seemed inconvenienced. although i think that madeleine is just fine with steri strips and no stitches, it would have been nice to at least have dave check it out.

through sepia glasses

sometimes i have the overwhelming desire to share experiences and places from my childhood with randy.

i would take him to chautauqua lake. i want him to feel the hot parking lot against his feet as he runs to the beach. i want him to feel the inexplicable urge to don an old fashioned striped bathing suit as he wades into the water. maybe he would want to grow a wavy mustache. i want to eat cold ice cream with him as the perfect end to an afternoon in the sandy brown water.

i wonder if it would feel as magical as it did when i was six.

i think it would.

preface: winco has you bag your own groceries

i often think of things that i would like to say to random strangers.

for instance, to the speedy man bagging his groceries opposite me at the grocery store, i would say, "yes, but you have the advantage of having worked as a bagger for four years in your small town grocery store."

fortunately, i generally refrain from making such comments.

a frequent scene at our house

diane is standing up on the couch, making elephant noises as an expression of how pleased she is with her accomplishment of pulling herself up there all by herself.

she's winning me over all over again.

if only she could figure out how to get down.

one for the grandmas

because i haven't posted a whole bunch of random photos of the girls in a while and they're changing so fast lately. especially this one.

loves grabbing my hair

crawling everywhere

climbing up on stuff and cruising. yikes!

runny noses

learning her way around the piano

loves her high chair lately

three girls having too much fun together

even uncle ray looked at the camera for this one

canning tomatoes

as part of my preservation kick, i decided to can some marinara sauce and diced tomatoes. i wish i could say that my tomato plants were producing enough for me to can some, but they aren't. don't get me wrong, they are producing enough for us to eat (almost) as many as we want fresh, but not enough to can.

so, i went and bought a big box of tomatoes and made a whole lot of marinara sauce. it is a delicious recipe and i am excited to eat it all winter.

and i even had some tomatoes left over to can diced tomatoes. these should be great in recipes. they better be, because canning is a lot of work.

this weekend? peaches. maybe pears. we'll see.

a haiku

brace face, wipe, console

layer of slime covers me

the river flows on

my girls have colds this week. no fun.

randy hikes timp

mt. timpanogos from our backyard

 ever since hiking half dome, randy says that he's felt compelled to climb mountains. since we have several around us, he picked mt. timpanogos as his next climb. a couple weeks ago, he hiked it with his friend, drew. i would have loved to have gone with him, but nursing babies kind of prevent that. they left early in the morning and made it back around 3:30. randy said it was a great hike and took lots of pictures. i'm sure that drew was annoyed, but i had asked randy to take some for me to see and he complied.

randy at the trailhead

drew at the trailhead

randy at first falls

the scramble right before the top

drew and mountain goat

at the summit

mountain goats

at one point, they had to wait for the mountain goats to get off the trail

apparently they hiked down this

sliding down the glacier

madeleine kept asking where daddy was and it was pretty fun to point out the window and tell her that he was hiking that mountain. now, she occasionally points at the mountain and says, "daddy hiked that mountain with his friend." his next goal is to climb the other mountain we can see from our backyard. we're also hoping to do squaw peak sometime soon on a saturday. not as strenuous, but a fun hike.