the kiddos

because they're cute and i have a bunch of random photos...

these girls love their brother.

he's hard to crack, but he has started smiling a little more lately.

standard scene at our house.

so handsome.

not sure what this pose was.

he's my squishy.

burrito baby.

sisters weekend 2012

every year for the past few years, my mom and sisters and i get together for a weekend and hang out together. only nursing babies are allowed and we get to relax and spend time with each other without chasing our children around.

it is fun every year, but i was especially excited for this year, since i've recently moved and already miss my sisters. we had our annual sisters weekend this last weekend at my mom's house.* jonathan and i flew down thursday night and left at the crack of dawn monday morning. he did great with flying, for which i was grateful.

we always exchange gifts at our sisters weekend. this year, i got trader joe's dish cloths for everyone, since i am now near a trader joe's. audrey got everyone gift wrap supplies, beth made us homemade dove liquid soap, and my mom got us three books (i've been drooling over that pride and prejudice children's counting book for some time now) and made us makeup bags.

the weekend was spent relaxing, eating good food, talking, and working on projects. i tackled the annual family photo album and barely squeaked it out in time. let's just say i had some sleep to catch up on once i got home.

randy was so good to me to take the girls for a long weekend all alone while i was gone. it was good to have a little break and i missed them terribly by the time i had to go home. it was perfect. nothing like some time away from your children to make you miss them.

can't wait for next year!

*utah peeps, don't be mad at me. this was a trip specifically for my sisters weekend and i think my mom and sisters would have killed me if i tried to squeeze in visits with all of my friends as well. next time i'm in utah i will be good about letting people know.

mother of the year*

i know that i've talked about my mom on my blog before, and i appreciate her every mother's day, but this year is especially poignant for a couple reasons. one is that we just moved away from her and that has been hard. i don't like to think about it, so i won't dwell on it because then i won't be able to type due to blinding tears. the other reason is that my mom has been such an amazing help to our little family for the past month and a half.

my mom is a busy woman. on top of normal day-to-day responsibilities, she is currently the relief society president in her ward, which gives her demanding and time consuming responsibilities for the physical and spiritual well being of the women that attend church with her. she also helps to care for her parents, taking them to several appointments and visiting them often throughout the week. as if she weren't busy enough with these things and her own life, my mom devoted the month of april and the first week of may to me and my family.

i'm not exaggerating. my mom took my girls while i was in the hospital after having jonathan and then as soon as we came home, she came to my house several times a week for the next three weeks and essentially packed my house for me, while simultaneously keeping my household going with cleaning, feeding the kids, etc. i severely overestimated how much i would be able to do on my own with three small children and she kicked right in and picked up the slack without missing a beat. while all of this was going on she also attended all of randy's graduation events (which take up a surprising amount of time). oh, and did i mention that she was deathly ill one weekend and within 24 hours of that was back at my house packing again?

after spending all of april helping us pack, she (and my dad) also devoted the first week of may to help drive us up to seattle and then proceeded to help me unpack all of my boxes and get me settled in so that i wouldn't be overwhelmed and probably still surrounded by boxes.

i can never repay my mom for all that she did for us this past month, but console myself with the thought that with all of the time that she spent helping us, she was also spending time with me. it was a nice way to try and get as much time in with her as i possibly could before we moved. we had many hours of being able to talk and visit while we were working and hopefully that made it worth it for her. it certainly made all of that packing more enjoyable for me. 

love you, mom.

*honorable mention for mother of the year goes to my mother-in-law, who came and helped with the kids and packing after jonathan was born and who would have done as much as my mom if she lived by us. 

st. ed's

one of the things i was most looking forward to about moving back to the northwest was a return to the beautiful parks here. i was especially excited that we moved only minutes away from one of my very favorite parks, st. edwards state park. i spent hours and hours there when i was in high school and couldn't wait to return.


we took the girls last week and i was pleasantly surprised to find out that they have put in a giant children's play structure since the time that i used to go (another thing that has changed about the park since i used to go is that it is now a fee area. not as great, but we bought a pass for the year right away and will utilize it often). they even have an area for toddlers, which is really nice for my girls, who are used to having the playground by our house all to themselves and are still a little scared to share playgrounds with big kids.

 
we have been back a few times already and the girls love it there. i love that it is surrounded by trees and there is actually a balance of shade and sunlight for me to pick from, depending on the weather (so many utah play structures are out in the blazing sun with no shade). we live in such a beautiful area.

the park also has a bunch of trails that lead down to the waterfront, which is the part of the park that i love the most. randy has gone running there a few times, but i haven't made it onto the trails yet. i'm a little nervous to brave the trails with the girls because i just know that they will get down to the bottom and then "run out of energy," (one of madeleine's favorite phrases) and we will get to haul them all the way back up. one of these days i'll do it.

one funny thing about parks in general: before going to st. ed's, we went to a couple of parks with the girls that didn't have play structures. madeleine kept asking where the park was and we had to explain to her that here, the scenery is pretty enough to constitute a park without needing a playground. she didn't seemed thrilled about this, but quickly forgot about slides and swings once she got to stand by the waterfront and throw rocks in.

smells like octogenarian spirit

here are some videos of me walking around the house. not thrilling for most of you, but some of my family wanted to see where we're living. sorry for the bad cinematography, it's just me walking around with my iphone. also, i realized that i sound kind of depressed and monotone in the videos. i was holding jonathan and he was sleeping, so i was trying not to wake him up. oh well.

what i started to say at the end of the first video, but which got cut off, is that it used to be a half wall between the kitchen and studio, but while my dad was here, he helped randy wall it off and hang a door, which will make it much nicer for both us and randy. 

the house is kind of a weird layout, but it's growing on me. it really is ideal for randy's studio, so it's worth having to deal with a dining room/living room in one. 

i'm not sure why the videos kept getting cut off, but there is also a bathroom upstairs to the left of the girls' room. it is nice and big and has a skylight in it, which i love. 

the house has some weird quirks* that i didn't really get at first, but after receiving some mail for "comfort living adult family home LLC," they make more sense. like the numbers on the bedroom doors, and all of the handles in the bathrooms and showers. i told randy that we could grow old in this house together. not that we plan on it.

*including the fact that it smelled when we first moved in. at first i thought the previous residents had a dog, but now i recognize that it smells more like an old folks' home. nothing that a little airing out won't fix, but not my favorite smell and not great for my sensitive nose.

still here

well, we moved and are getting settled in, so i guess it's time to start blogging more consistently. especially now that grandparents and aunts and uncles from both sides need to see pictures more often. and because jonathan is growing and changing so quickly.

i will also post some pictures of the house soon (maybe even a video tour?). but for now, some pictures of the kids:

a creative outfit. i bet you can guess who got herself dressed.