Celebration

Celebration is such a non-celebratory word.  It's so ... boring-sounding.  It's not like party, which is fun to say and even funner to say loudly.  Anyway.

Last night was Parent-Teacher Conferences.  Rob and I went together to all 3 conferences, one right after the other, rapid-fire-like.  And, pleasantly enough, they were all great.  We heard good things about our kids, which is nice, cause we think they're pretty good kids.  A short sum-up of how they're doing in school:

Miciah - 4th Grade

(As a side note:  Miciah loved that the picture captured the one zit on her forehead.  It's a sign of growing up, and she was kinda proud of that.  Funny.)

As always, she's loving Language Arts.  She's in an advanced Language Arts program, which means harder homework and higher expectations.  She's loving it.  She was so proud of herself for acing spelling tests 2 weeks in a row this month.  She has a lot of homework this year, but she does it without complaining most nights, and I hardly ever have to remind her.  That girl is a Get-it-Done Machine.

We met with her Math teacher who was shocked to learn that Miciah has never liked Math.  When she told us how well she was doing, I stopped and said, "Yeah, I wanted to ask about that.  What in the world are you doing in class?  Miciah LOVES it!"  And who knows what the secret really is, but she's tearin' it up.

About a month into school, Miciah brought home her first timed multiplication test.  I stared at the page, with the 100% circled in the top right corner.  "Was this timed, Miciah?"  She said it was.  "How long did you have to do it?"  She'd finished the whole page, which she'd almost never done in 3rd grade, so I thought she was going to tell me that they'd had 10 minutes to do it.  When she told me she'd finished it all (correctly!) in 5 minutes it was all I could do to not say, "Really?!!"

The teacher we met with, who is also her homeroom teacher, also gave her a very nice compliment.  She said, "Miciah is just so comfortable being Miciah.  She doesn't seem to care what other people think."  And it's true.  I don't know how long she'll hold onto that (hopefully forever, right?!), but it's wonderful.

Elijah - 2nd Grade

Our spastic child is also quite smart.  Which often leads him to believe that he knows everything.  Sometimes Rob has to hold back his I-want-to-smash-you-to-show-you-that-you're-not-all-that feelings cause, you know, Elijah is our son after all.  We don't want him to have a complex.

But he's doing great in school.  He's loving Math and often challenges himself at home with harder math problems.  He'll say, "Look, Mom.  I'm stretching my brain."  Love it.  The one "complaint" that his teacher had is that Elijah struggles with showing how he got his answers on Math tests.  That whole show your work thing.  She says when she brings it up with him, he'll just look at her as if it say, "Well, the answer is 8.  That's obvious."

We worked really, really hard with Elijah on his handwriting last year.  Well, that takes away from his achievement a little.  Elijah worked really, really hard, and we pushed him to do so.  He just didn't understand why his teacher should be able to read his papers.  He'd always say, "Well, I can read it."  So it's nice to see all that hard work paying off.  Now they'll start working on writing, which should be a nice challenge for Elijah.  Typically, he's the kid with less to say (see the above paragraph in relation to Math).  I'm interested to see how he does.

Teancom - Kindergarten

I've said this before, I think, but Tank LOVES Kindergarten.  His teacher is one of those genuinely nice people.  The type you meet only a few times in a lifetime.  He adores her (and truth be told, so do I).

It's funny.  Tank never was into coloring or reading or any of that before Kindergarten started.  I was worried that he would have no interest in what they were doing in school.  But his love for learning took over and is helping him overcome his desire to do nothing.  (The boy can lay on the floor for hours.  Not joking.)  His teacher told us that he really loves science, which isn't new information to us, it's just interesting that she noticed it, too.  They've done a few science experiments, and she said that Tank's eyes light up every time.  It must be genetic, cause that's totally his father.

Teancom is sounding out words like a champ, and is beginning to read.  He knows all his letters, can write his name correctly, can count to 100, and loves to color.  I list all that because these were all things that he couldn't or wouldn't do as of August.  AUGUST!  It's been fantastic to see his explosive academic growth.

Unique to Teancom's growing up experience (for my kids) is that he gets to go to a babysitter's house 2 mornings a week.  We are super lucky that it's our good friend, Rachel, who loves Tank and treats him like a king.  Teancom adores her and LOVES going to her house.  It's such a relief to me to see that, cause I feel just a smidgen guilty about not being with him, even though I know that me going to school right now is good.  He begs to go to her house and is disappointed when I have time off school.  That's a perfect arrangement.

Tank loves to do his homework.  He only gets just a little each week, but he begs to do it as soon as he walks in the door.  He's very self-motivated, like Miciah is.  (Kindergarten year was a struggle with Elijah.  We had to force him to do his homework.  That was true nearly the entire year.  It was brutal.)

Party!

Rob and I drove home and talked about how great it was that our kids are doing well in school.  It was nice to have the teachers all say, "You're doing a great job with your kid," and then honestly respond, "Well, we think you're doing a great job with our kid, too.  Thank you."  We arrived home, Rob turned off the engine, and then he just sat there.  I thought he had something scary-important to tell me.  He said, "We just had these great conferences with our kids.  We only heard good things about them.  Let's do something nice for our kids tonight.  Something to celebrate."  I thought that was a great idea!

So we ordered specialty pizza that we normally don't buy.  We got soda.  We bought 3 kinds of ice cream and let the kids eat it in a cone.  And we ran a fun little science experiment / craft project (folding paper and putting it on water.  Seriously fun).  The kids got to stay up late, and everyone had a great time.

It was a nice reminder.  Our kids really are fantastic little human beings, and they try so hard to be good.  That's definitely something to celebrate.

Here's a cool video about the folded paper on water thing.  Ours weren't this intricate, of course, but it's the same idea:

Flottille (detail) from Etienne Cliquet on Vimeo.

Love Those Kids

Elijah

Some missionaries spoke at the church we attended today.  The second talk was about being a Gospel-Sharing Home.  I was listening, because I was interpreting the talk to myself (which always makes me feel like an idiot, which is why I don't do it more often).  I hadn't really given it a ton of thought, though, other than thinking that he gave a good story about his conversion.  It struck me as one of those "Yes, yes.  I should be doing missionary work, I get it" type of talks.

Sacrament meeting ended and before Elijah left for Primary he said, "Mom, I want to go over to the Jasper's house."  The Jasper's are our neighbors.  They're the cutest elderly people in the world, and they're great neighbors.  But I wasn't making the connection to the sudden interest in talking about them.  I asked Elijah to continue.  "I want to read the Book of Mormon with them."  What a cute, diligent boy.  I asked him which part of the Book of Mormon he wanted to read with them and he said, "I don't know.  I think I'll just start at the beginning."  And with that he walked to class.

I listened to the talk.  I was even paying attention.  But Elijah was listening with an open heart.

For as rambunctious as that little boy is, he sure teaches us a lot about living the Gospel.  His heart is nearly always in the right place.  Have I told you about him and Rick?  They've always had a strong connection, ever since Elijah was born.  During Rick's prolonged hospital stay, Elijah was the one always reminding us to pray for Rick.  In fact, I think he still includes him in his prayers, even though Rick is now home and doing "fine." 

Here's what gets me, though.  Since Rick has been home, Elijah has gone over to see him nearly every day.  EVERY DAY.  How many times have I personally been over?  Three times, maybe, in the last month or so.  Elijah goes over and talks to him, who knows about what.  He checks his legs to see if Rick is increasing his muscle mass.  He's so concerned.  You can just tell that that little boy understands that he almost lost his favorite great Uncle, and he now is determined to take care of him. 

It's just amazing to me.  I have all those adult concerns.  What if I don't have the right thing to say?  Well, I can't go over anyway, cause I'm busy.  He doesn't need me to go see him, he's fine.  All those kinds of things go through my head.  But Elijah just goes over.  As Rick put it, "it's precious."

Teancom

And then there's Tank.  The other day I asked him to help me do something.  I forget what it was, but it wasn't a big thing.  I'm used to the "I don't want to!" reaction that I get from some unnamed others, so I was shocked when after I told him thank you he said thank you right back.  I asked, "For what?"  He said, "For letting me help.  I like to help."  Aww.

Miciah

Honestly, Miciah has been getting on my nerves lately.  She has lots more homework this year, and I think it stresses her out a little, and we all know that I'm already stressed out.  Some days are fine, but other days aren't so fine.  Then Rob and I are together over the weekends and I start back over at Monday feeling alright again.

But Miciah's awesome.  She's still zany and likes being around us and her little brothers.  She loves babies, particularly the nearly-toddler age, and wants to help take care of them all she can.  She's writing a book for school and she's way excited about it.  She's reading Harry Potter so much that she stays up til ridiculous hours and then is grouchy the next day and blames us for not getting her homework done (go figure that one out).  Still, she's reading up a storm and acing Math tests and loving school.  It's great.

Plus, she's hilarious.  Even when she's mad, all I have to do is make a silly face at her and she's giggling and then making me giggle.  She has so much positive energy. 

Love those kids.

(Oh!  And love that husband, too.  In 2 weeks he has his first "professional" Great Thackeroni gig.  Though, he's not going to let them pay him except with a piece of birthday cake.  I've talked with Rob about this Great Thackeroni thing.  He always downplays the compliments he recieves, but I tell him he shouldn't.  Rob has a gift.  Clearly it's not magic.  That's obvious.  It's making people happy.  Making people smile.  And he can do it in so many ways!  He can sing, he's got zany accents he can pull out, fake magic he can perform.  Know what I would do if given a stage and 10 minutes to make people happy?  Fail miserably, that's what I would do.  And THAT'S what people see.  Rob has a gift that most of the rest of us don't.  It's awesome.)

It Makes Me Laugh

I should post something like an update, but I'm not in the mood.  The kids are off school, so that's fun.  Today's my birthday, so that's fun.  ...  Whatever.  Here are some recent funny stories.  No boy body parts involved, so these are family-friendly.

Not a Clue

Miciah is now old enough to play real board games with us.  It's awesome!  She was introduced to Clue by Carol (her best friend / backyard neighbor), and I said, "Hey, we own Clue.  We own The Simpsons Clue.  Even better."  So Rob played it with her, and then last night the 3 of us played it together.  It's fun, but simple, and we were having a great time.

I went into a room and made the normal "I don't have much of an idea of who it is" guess, and no one had anything.  So that's it, I thought.  I lucked onto the answer.  My next turn I made the accusation for real:  Bart Simpson with the poisoned donut in the Burns Manor.  Only it wasn't right.  I pulled out the cards and said, "Someone lied to me."  And then Rob said, "Oh, I have Bart Simpson right here."

I just looked at him and then Miciah and I died laughing as Rob went on to say, "I was wondering why you were guessing him.  I was like, 'I've had an X down on his name since the beginning.'"

Nice.

(Oh, by the way, isn't The Simpsons Clue awesome?!  Mr. Smithers is Mrs. White.  How funny is that?  You can kill someone with a plutonium rod, Lisa's necklace, a sling shot, etc.  Totally fun.)

The Phone Call

On Saturday Rob and I were at a wedding and accompanying festivities for a large part of the day.  On the way home I called to check in with my brother who was holding down the fort for us.  Elijah answered.  We talked for a minute about how he wanted to plant more sunflower seeds and then I asked him to give the phone to Keith.  It went something like this:

Elijah:  I love you, Mom.
Me:  I love you, too, Elijah.  Can I talk to Keith now?
Elijah:  Sure.
long pause
Elijah:  Umm, Mom?
Me:  Yes?
Elijah:  I love you.
Me:  I love you, too, Elijah.  Can I talk to Keith?
Elijah: Yeah.
Me:  Okay, thanks.
long pause
Me:  Hello?
Elijah:  Yeah?
Me:  Can you go get Keith?  Is he there?
Elijah:  Yeah.
Me:  Okay.
long pause
Elijah:  Umm, Mom?  How do you turn it off?
Me:  Turn what off?
Elijah:  The phone.
Me:  I don't WANT you to turn the phone off!  I want you to give the phone to Keith!
Elijah:  Oh.  Okay.
long pause
Keith:  Hello?

Elijah is flaky in the cutest sort of way.  I think he's giving the phone to my brother and what is he really doing?  Waiting to tell me that he loves me again.  What a cutie.

Tank Loves Birds

Rob loves field guides.  He'd collect them all if he could.  So far we have 6 or 7 of them.  Field guides about birds, minerals, mammals, insects.  When we went to Yellowstone, he bought another one for the area so he could identify flowers there.  Rob's adorable.

Our youngest son inherited this apparently genetic trait.  So when Rob asked him a few days ago if he wanted to look at a book that would tell him the names of all the local birds, Tank's response was, "Yes!  Yes!  Yes!  Yes!  Yeeeesss!"  He was jumping up and down he was so excited.  Tank's adorable.

It just cracked me up.  How can one be so excited about looking at a field guide?

Miciah

And, in general, Miciah is hilarious.  Rob will say something goofy and Miciah will take it one step further and by the end the two of them are laughing so hard they're crying.  It's great.  I would tell a story in particular, but usually it's something random like:
"I look like a mouse."
"Yeah, a mouse with a beard."

I know you have to be there for those sorts of things, but you should know that it's awesome.

Make a Wish

For the weekend Elijah spent time with Rob's parents for Grandson Weekend.  Every year they take all the grandsons or all the granddaughters and do fun activities with them and let them know that they're special.  It's awesome. 

This weekend was particularly well timed because Elijah's been driving me crazy.  He's really ... active.  He'll come home from school and run around the house laughing and screaming and whistling and play fighting with his brother.  It's a lot of a lot.  (I try to pretend that he got this trait from Rob.  But Rob isn't a lot of a lot of anything other than sweet and nice and gentle.  And then, at class last week, when I was really excited and jittery for no reason, my classmates asked, "Are your kids like this, too?"  And I had to admit that Elijah was.)  Having a quiet weekend was a needed change.

Though it wasn't completely quiet.  Rob's sister came down with her 2 daughters, and we had a full weekend of fun.  We went to Newport on the Levee where the kids got balloon animals from a very nice circus performer and we walked across the purple people bridge.  Then a picnic and Cold Stone ice cream. 

Later we went to the museum center and saw the omnimax film Tornado Alley.  The movie proved that I am not meant to be a storm chaser.  My thoughts were, "That's really neat looking.  Now run away!"  I asked Tank if he liked it and he said yes.  Then I asked if he wanted to grow up and be a storm chaser.  He said no.  Smart boy.

On the way out of the museum center we stopped to look at the water fountain.  It's gorgeous and fun and, most importantly for the kids, it's water.

They all got a penny to make a wish and Miciah and the girls ran to find the perfect wishing spot.  Tank stayed with me and Rob and thought for a second.  Then he said, "I wish Elijah were dead," and threw his penny into the fountain.

Obviously that's not happiness.  Rob and I immediately started asking Tank why he would say that.  We weren't mean about it, we just wanted to know what was going on.  Tank started bawling.  I picked him up in my arms and found a good place to sit.

Me:  You don't want Elijah to die.  You like Elijah.
Tank:  No, I don't.
Me:  But you like to play with him, right?
Tank:  No.  He's mean to me.
Me:  How is he mean to you?
Tank:  He hits me.
Me:  Oh, that's not nice.  Does he do anything else?
Tank:  He's bossy.
Me:  Oh.  Well, you like playing with him when he's nice, right?
Tank:  Yeah.
Me:  So how about we change our wish to 'I wish Elijah were nicer to me'?
Tank (reluctantly):  Okay.

Guess we'll have to talk to that Elijah about being nicer.  Cause when your brother's first thought for a wish is that you would die, something's gotta change.

I Can Fix That! (Lazy Parenting Style)

A few nights ago Elijah's arm hurt.  He kept getting out of bed to tell me so.  The first time he got up, I took a look at the offending spot, on the inside of his elbow.  Normally it's Rob's job to play doctor--since he is Dr. Thacker, you know--but Rob wasn't around.  So I tried to be as professional as possible as I bent Elijah's arm at the elbow, pressed on it, swiveled it, and asked him if it hurt when he did anything in particular.  No red flags were going up.  The area was red, though.  I spent a little time wondering what might be causing the redness.  Then Elijah hit his arm a few times.  Ah.  Yes.  That would do it.

"Why are you hitting your arm, Elijah?"
"Because it hurts."
"Well, don't do that."

I sent him back to bed.

A little while later he was wailing softly to himself.  Except it didn't end up being just to himself because he woke up his brother.  I wasn't happy.  I got him out of bed and told him to lay down on my bed so at least he wouldn't disturb his brother by his wailing.  Sensitive Mother to the rescue!  I advised him that the best thing to do would be to calm down and go to sleep.

Shockingly, he kept wailing to himself.  By this time I was looking at the clock, wondering if I could stall long enough for Rob to come home and take care of things.  I decided it would be too long to wait.  I'd have to come up with a solution myself.  (Again, bed time and medicine are Rob's areas of expertise.)  And I thought of it!

I got Elijah out of bed again and asked if he'd like some medicine to help with the pain.  Medicine fixes everything!  I sent him to the couch so he wouldn't see my sneak.  I got out the dosage cup and poured in some juice.  It's juice that Elijah doesn't like, so I knew he wouldn't recognize it.  I brought it to him and he gratefully drank it down.

"It tastes funny," he said.
"Medicine often does."

I sent him back to (my) bed.

There are all these studies about the power of placebos, and I was banking on that to work.  Clearly there wasn't anything Wrong with his arm.  But I was still feeling bad when he was crying 5 minutes later.  Then 10 minutes later.  Not enough time for even Tylenol to work, I told myself.  At the 15 minute mark, when I was re-thinking the whole placebo idea, he finally quieted down and went to sleep.

Whew.  Lazy Parenting works again!

My Sons

Elijah today told me that he has rocks in his stomach so he can breathe. I repeated the statement back to him as a question, for clarification, and he said, "Yeah. Look." Then he took a few deep breaths and said, "See? I have rocks in my stomach."

Someday I would LOVE to get inside his head so I could figure out what in the heck he's talking about when he says things!

Miciah never really went through a stage like this. She was always an excellent communicator and picked up adult explanations for things quickly. So it's fascinating to listen to Elijah explain things. Sometimes I can listen and I'll observe what he sees and I'll think, "That makes so much sense!" And then other times it's rocks in his stomach that allow him to breathe. :)

Kids crack me up.

Today Teancom received a birthday card from Grandma D (she's so sweet to send cards to all the great grandkids). I read it to him and then handed it to him. He walked around with it, holding it, saying, "Mine!" Then he was opening and closing it, like a mouth, and saying, "Roar!" Elijah tried to take the card and Teancom screamed at him and I made Elijah give it back. Teancom nibbled on the card a little (to see what it tastes like?). He pulled the decoration off the front of the card. He threw the card on the ground and began stomping on it.

This whole time he's loving having this card that is HIS. He's not meanly stomping on the card (no "I hate Grandma" sentiments there). He's loving playing with it. And he's loving that it's his. He banged it up to shreds, but he loved every moment of it. I thought about how most people just get a card and look at it. Teancom PLAYED with his.

I watched this funny funny scene and thought, "This is going to be the highlight of my day, I can tell."

Why Kids Crack Me Up

Kids crack me up. Plain and simple. Everyday they're doing maybe 20 things that make me laugh.

Teancom:

Teancom came in after Elijah hit him on the head this morning. Why did Elijah hit him on the head? I don't know. But Teancom came to me vaguely upset by it. I held him for a moment and put Elijah in a timeout. Elijah came out of the timeout to see how mad I was (you know, quickly ready to retreat again if I got stern), and I told him to apologize to Teancom. Elijah said he was sorry and Teancom just sucked his fingers and held his ear. I told Teancom to say, "It's okay," which he did. Then, as Elijah was running off, Teancom said what he really was thinking, "That's RUDE!"

Elijah:

Elijah was outside playing with Miciah in the kiddie pool we have. He'd been out there for over a half an hour when I heard the door open. Elijah poked his head in and said, "Mom, I need my Spider-Man suit." Then, before I could answer, he said, "Oh. This is my Spider-Man suit," and closed the door.

Miciah:

Miciah asked if she could play a computer game. I told her that would be fine if she got dressed for the day and cleaned up her bedroom. She seemed to think that was reasonable (she's getting paid to do chores, and cleaning her bedroom is one of the things she can get money for), and started cleaning her room. A while later Elijah entered the room. I knew he was getting it slightly messy, because he gave a telltale sign: he walked into the room. If he enters a room, he will try to make a mess of it. A while after that, Elijah came into my room where I was and we started being goofy and having a good time. I could hear Miciah calling for me, but figured she wasn't in peril and besides I was having fun with Elijah. After a while she started getting pretty forceful, so I went into the room. This is what I found:

Woah! All of Elijah's drawers were on the ground, devoid of clothes, and Miciah was inside Elijah's skeleton of a dresser saying she was "trapped." All the books and clothes were piled against Miciah's dresser, maybe 2 feet high.

Of course, I didn't think this was funny at the time. I was mad. She said Elijah had "forced" her inside and she couldn't get out. That's Lie #1 and #2. Elijah was mainly responsible for making a mess of the room, no doubt, but there were other options she could have chosen. Mainly, I just don't like being lied to.

Nor do I like cleaning horribly messy rooms. It's still not clean. I told Miciah that Dad would have to help when he got home. Because I wasn't dealing with it. And no, she couldn't play a computer game anyway.

Kids are a crack up.

I have wise friends who have had 10 kids. That's not what makes them wise; what makes them wise is that after 10 kids, they're still laughing about life. They said to me once, "You'll laugh about it later, might as well laugh about it now." I'm trying to do that. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It's a work in progress.

Tamra

Playing with Daddy

We had some friends over on Wednesday night and my kids mobbed Cody. Cody was a lion and they climbed all over him and wrestled with him and wouldn't leave him alone for probably a good hour. I felt bad for Cody until I realized that, as an adult, he had the power to stop it. Rob turned to me and said, "I guess I need to play with my kids more." I looked back at him with that wife-only look of, "You THINK?" mixed with, "Don't even get me started..."

Yesterday I took the kids to a splash park. They did AMAZINGLY well and gave me hope that motherhood isn't always insanity. After we got home, I put Miciah's swimming suit in the washing machine. A little while later she came up to me and said, "Mom, where is my swim suit?" I told her it was in the washing machine. "But Mom, I NEED my swim suit." Well, it was dirty after a few days. Why do you need it? "Because, Mom. I have a surprise for Daddy. When he gets home I'm going to tell him I have a surprise for him and when he comes in the back yard, I'm going to splash him!" Oh.

That was around 2 o'clock. At about 5 Rob got home. He walked around back to see what the kids were doing. He came back to the front door and knocked. I opened the door and he was a little wet. He told me that Miciah had tried to splash him, but he wasn't falling for it. I told him that Miciah had been planning the "surprise" for hours. And because he's a good daddy and he didn't want to disappoint her plan, he went back to get splashed.

A little while later he came back again to the front door and this time he was SOAKED. :) I told him he had to go back so I could get some "action shots". What a fun day!

Elijah getting thrown in the pool by Daddy.

Now it's Miciah's turn!

Rob doesn't like this picture for reasons that might be obvious to my father.

I wouldn't let Rob come in the house with those clothes on. I made him strip, underwear and all, while I held a towel to shield him. ... I didn't hang the underwear out to dry, though.

Tamra

A genius parenting moment

Elijah came in to me and said he needed a bandaid. Right. Why did Elijah need a bandaid? Who knows. He said his finger hurt, but I glanced at his finger, told him it wasn't bleeding, so he didn't need a bandaid. He responded by throwing himself on the ground throwing a HUGE fit. I was unmoved.

Finally, after maybe 5 minutes of this, I re-looked at his finger. What an amazing mom I felt like when I discovered a sliver in his finger! It was maybe 1/4 inch long, and was sticking straight down into his finger under his fingernail! You KNOW that has to hurt.

I promised him a bandaid if he let me pull it out. It easily came out and then the fit stopped. I held him for a few minutes, apologizing continually, "I'm SO sorry, my man. I'm SO sorry, buddy. I'm sorry. ..." He let me hold him and whimpered a little while he calmed down. Teancom walked up behind me and Elijah said, "Teancom, your magic didn't work!" Then he said to me, "Teancom thinks he's magic, but he's not."

Teancom is 2 years old. I want to know how Elijah interpreted Teancom's claim to be a magician.

We put a bandaid on Elijah's finger and that was the end of it, life was better. Give me the prize for Genius Parenting Moment!

It's That Time Again!

Another update. Not that there's much to update, like usual. Just normal life happenings here, nothing momentous.

It's BEAUTIFUL here. It seems like it's almost skipped Spring and moved straight into Summer. And everything exploded into bloom all at once. It's been a spectacular Spring and I don't think I've ever been more moved by the Earth waking up. Probably partly because I feel like, in a lot of ways, I'm waking up myself. This has been a good year for us with a lot of good (little) things happening, and it's been a nice feeling. We won the Health and Fitness Challenge, so I feel like I have a new me--body and spirit. Rob is in the Bishopric and I'm a Primary teacher, so we have new church responsibilities. I'm writing articles for M and C, so I have a new job. I'm on an indoor soccer team now--a renewing of old loves. And we did a No Whining Chart for Miciah (more details to come), so I feel like a new Mom! Lots of newness going around.

And then Spring came. We had a late winter storm in mid-March, and it stayed colder off-and-on until early April. And then WHAM it was 70 and 80 degrees out and all the flowers, trees, and grass that hadn't been growing or blooming yet said, "Oh. That's right," and they all decided to bloom and grow, all at once. Like I said, it's been amazing. Spring isn't my favorite season, but if I could have kept that feeling all year, I wouldn't mind that at all. Euphoria.


The Immunology Conference and Rob's Knee

Rob enjoyed the Immunology Conference all right. He said it was warmer here than it was in San Diego, and that's just not right. He didn't get out of it as much as he would have liked, but I didn't feel that bad for him since he got to eat out every night on someone else's tab.

While he was in San Diego, he injured his knee. The bad knee. The one that's already had surgery. Nice. He's been wanting to go back into the doctor for some time about other little things like his hip being really tight, and his ankle that he sprained a few months ago, but that's still hurting him. With the knee injury I finally insisted he go in to the doctor that did his knee surgery. It's normal to have some knee pain kneeling, but for it to surface 3 years after surgery, and while just walking? Odd.

By the time he got into the doctor, his knee wasn't hurting as bad, but the doc still sent him to a physical therapist. The doc took some X-rays and said his knee still looks good, and his ACL is still tight. So no worries there. And the physical therapist has been very helpful. He gave Rob lots of stretches to do and it's already helped (he's only been doing them for 3 days). What they think this whole thing all boils down to (the knee, ankle, and hip problems) is the fact that Rob's been walking differently since he hurt his knee (that was 6 years ago!). He's changed his gait to compensate for the injury, and it's finally caught up with him (Rob took off his Sunday shoes that he's had for the same amount of time he's had his injury (we're buying him new ones with the new suit he needs and we'll buy come Friday--the shoes are trashed and the suit is now too big) and showed me the bottoms of them. The right shoe--the treads were almost gone in places. But you could still see all the treads on the left shoe). They're hoping with physical therapy and the stretches, they can bring everything back to normal and set it all right. ... It's kind of a bummer to pay all this money for X-rays and doctors and physical therapists, but we've been through a period where Rob didn't have a working knee, and it wasn't good. We're willing to pay the money to make it right again. It wouldn't be very fun for Rob to have to be in pain the rest of his life.

That's Rob's news.

Indoor Soccer

My news. I am on a co-ed indoor soccer team. We're not very good, but we have fun and that's what matters (which is the slogan for losers, I know). I've only played one game so far, but it surprised me what comes to me still and what I've lost. It was nice to pull out my cleats and put them on again. I made Rob address my shoes like they were my old friends. I feel like that's what they are. I was trying to figure out how long I've had them, and I know it was since mid-high school. That's over 10 years. They're my friends. I got an assist at our game. The other team was MUCH better than we were (they've obviously played before and together): most of the people on our team have never played before at all. But it was most fun to watch the game from the bench and see who got called fouls on for what. One of the girls on our team--sweet, soft Sarah--got called on a foul. The guy stole the ball from her and was a few feet past her when he tripped, and the ref called a foul. Not only did she not actually foul the guy, she is not capable of fouling anyone. I called out (softly but loud enough), "Make sure he ties his shoes next time!"

The most exciting thing of the night was about our goalie. One of the guys on the other team who kicked the ball HARD (I'd forgotten how much more powerful guys are than girls. Every time he shot the ball, I turned away. I have a bruise on my upper arm from where I stopped one of his shots (on accident)) shot a ball right into our keeper's eyeball. His glasses flew from his face and landed a few feet away. The ref stopped play and gave the shooter a dirty look. The guy apologized profously, said he did it on accident, and got off the field fast to appease the ref. Our goalie went off, too, cause he couldn't see through one eye. His glasses weren't broken, thankfully, but he had a HUGE shiner. Didn't bruise up too colorful, but it was swollen, and his eyeball was a cool color red. :) He said he was thankful he didn't get seriously injured. Yeah. Cause it's all fun and games till someone ...

More Soccer, Different Person

Miicah is playing soccer this season. We signed her up months ago. When we got the first call from her coach, he informed us that all the games are on Sundays. So that put us in a cruch. What do we do? Does she quit the league or do we just let her play the 7 games? Rob and I weren't willing to make her suffer for our mistake (we should have just found out more details at the beginning), so we let her stay on the team, though we told her she wouldn't be playing in this league in the fall. Rob and I feel like idiots. The games are all "after church". They are for people who go to church for an hour from 10 - 11. But our church is from 10 - 1 and the games are usually AT 1. So we even have to pick up and leave before church is over. Oh well.

After Miciah's first practice she came home and announced, "I am a genius at soccer!" That isn't true, but she has a lot of fun playing, and she's been playing for 3 weeks and I'm super impressed with how much she's improved in that time. Plus it's warm outside now, so she's been kicking the ball around outside for fun. I showed her a move and it was hard for her to do. She said, "Practice makes perfect" and then tried over and over until she could do it. Kids are amazing.

So far Miciah is one of the weaker players, but none of them are fantastic: they're all 6- and 7-year-olds. They're just out having a good time.

I have learned several things through Miciah's involvement in soccer:
1. I'm the same kind of soccer parent that my parents were. I never really wanted to be, but now that I'm there, it sounds a whole lot nicer than being any other way. I didn't sit where the parents are "supposed" to sit. The sun was in the wrong place to sit there. I stood behind the other team's parents. You could see the field better. ... And practices and games aren't social time for me.

2. I have a hard time stomaching parents and coaches who yell at the kids. Period. Did you know these kids are 6 and 7? What's your problem? Don't yell at them!!

3. It's harder than I thought to let my two little boys wander off to play on the cool dirt pile. :) Memories flooded back to me of big soccer fields with corn fields surrounding them, or a swamp, or woods, or random dirt piles. I let Elijah and Teancom walk over to the big dirt pile, one eye on the game, one on the pile. The whole time I knew they were fine, but it was harder than I thought to just let them play 100 yards away.

Miciah's team got slaughtered for one of the games, not because the other team was better, but because there was 1 girl on the other team that was a super star. I was half glad it wasn't my team, because the parents of the other girls felt the need to make their kids be as good as that one prodigy, and they yelled at their kids mercilessly. But it struck me while watching this little girl who was exceptional, "Am I looking at myself when I was little?" That sounds cocky, so I quickly abandoned the idea that I might be. But it was an interesting thought still. Here was this 7-year-old who already knew field positioning, who was running circles around the other girls. She scored maybe 7 goals all by herself. She could dribble. She could actually shoot. She was coordinated. ... I was amazed.

We have to find another league for Miciah in the Fall.

Thank You, Barbie Mariposa

And Barbie Mariposa. Miciah has been asking for Barbie Mariposa, the newest Barbie movie, since she saw the previews on Barbie as the Island Princess (her Christmas gift). I told her I'd think about it, but the problem is, there's no upcoming event to give it to her for. Her birthday isn't till October, and by then it'll be old news. I found it for a good price and so I bought it and then held on to it and waited for inspiration to strike. I decided we should have her earn it, but I wasn't sure what for. I thought maybe for reading a certain number of books, but she needs no encouragement along those lines. I thought for something to do with school, but again, what? So finally I just showed it to her. She was so excited. I told her that she needed to earn it and it came to me right then: A No Whining Chart. For 15 days she had to not whine. Every night she'd get a sticker and when the chart was full, she could have the movie.


It was a BLISSFUL 17 days. She missed 2 days and was in tears as she told me it was just too hard! But she made it and filled up the chart. By the end, I didn't even need to remind her to not whine. At first, it was "Miciah, that sounds like it might be whining," and she would quickly change her tone.

What amazed me most about this adventure wasn't that she could do it. What amazed me was how much I had been reacting to her whining. The whining drives me INSANE and I didn't realize until there wasn't any whining how much I was simply reacting to her yucky tone. I would reply not so nicely and she would feed off that and so on back and forth. By the end of those 17 days I was calmer, I wasn't yelling at my kids, and I was SO much happier with Miciah. It was easier for me to be patient with her, and for me to be able to see and love all her good points. Thank you, Barbie Mariposa. A few days after she had earned the movie she was back to whining and I sat down and talked with her about how much easier it is for me if she chooses not to whine. She said, "I did that chart so that I wouldn't whine for the REST OF MY LIFE?!!" It cracked me up. She's done really pretty well since, and it's been blissful for me.


Cotton Can Sport

Elijah is now a crack-up. The latest awesome thing he's come up with is Cotton Can Sport. No, you're not supposed to understand that. One night he just came up with this person: Cotton Can Sport. So far as I can tell, it's a combination of Cotton Candy and Sport. The person apparently brings lots of candy. I think he's also kind of super-hero-ish. He sits down and tells us lengthy meaningless stories about Cotton Can Sport. Usually Cotton Can Sport has a house. ...dramatic pause... And his own tools. ...dramatic pause with dramatic facial expressions... Rob and I have a hard time not laughing. It's pretty cute.

During that soccer game he loved playing on the huge dirt pile. He would go around to the backside of it where we could barely see him and sometimes he'd be out of sight for a few seconds. There came a point in time when I hadn't seen him for maybe a minute or two. I decided to send Rob over to check out where he was. Rob was turning to walk over there when the game behind us was stopped by the blow of the ref's whistle. And Rob says, "Elijah's in the middle of the field!" The ref stopped the game because our son was just strolling through their game. :) They ushered him to the sidelines and Rob went to claim him. It made me giggle that probably people were thinking, "What awful parents." Unless they were older parents, in which case they probably thought, "That's happened to us about 20 times."

Teancom

Teancom is now tan. It's Spring. It's just not right to have a kid that, like Rob, is instantly tan when Spring hits. People already have called him an Indian baby. :) That olive skin. Teancom adores being outside. He wakes up in the morning and wants to go outside as soon as possible. Then he takes a nap midday and wants to go out as soon as he wakes up. Sometimes I'll look outside to see what he's doing, and usually he's just standing there, enjoying the weather, the wind on his face, whatever. It's cute.

I'll send some pictures of Teancom at M's baptism. He loves dip. He walked up to M, who had a full plate of food, and started eating all the dip she had to go with her chips. Teancom loves to dip the chip (or carrot, whatever's available), suck off the dip, and then dip again. Gross. We finally got him his own plate of dip and had to take pictures of it.

I still gush Teancom about 80 times a day and he still lets me. Loving it.

High-Speed Internet

Oh! We did get high-speed internet, and that's big news for us. Sure, we're a few years behind the times, but better late than never. I've caught up on all the videos I was saving up to watch on youtube, and I've updated my facebook and myspace sites. I can actually check my gmail account now and logon to my bank page without it stalling and giving me errors.

And in light of the high-speed internet, it must be time for me to start a blog, since I've had several requests in the last month or two. My problem is that I'm lovin' the e-mail format. So I need feedback. To blog or not to blog? That is the question.

Love you all and hope you're enjoying your Spring as much as we are!!

Tamra and family

Dude, I was serious about anyone wanting baby guppies. Apparently guppies have babies like rabbits, and we have a fresh batch of 6. That's 4 that survived the first birthing, 4 that survived the second birthing, and 6 new ones. Too many guppies!

Here's a picture of Rob being goofy. So out of character for him.

And two of Teancom covered in dip. He was so cute with the dip. He had it all over him and was so excited to eat it (it was all he had for lunch, I think). Their Uncle Aaron who was there was teasing Teancom to make him give him some dip. Teancom finally looked at him like, "Well, if you REALLY want it, ..." and then started trying to put a chip in Aaron's mouth. Cute.

Invisible Mother

I don't know who wrote this, but it has a good message about motherhood.

Invisible Mother

It all began to make sense, the blank stares, the lack of response, the way one of the kids will walk into the room while I'm on the phone and ask to be taken to the store. Inside I'm thinking, 'Can't you see I'm on the phone?' Obviously not; no one can see if I'm on the phone, or cooking, or sweeping the floor, or even standing on my head in the corner, because no one can see me at all. I'm invisible. The invisible Mom. Some days I am only a pair of hands, nothing more: Can you fix this ? Can you tie this? Can you open this??

Some days I'm not a pair of hands; I'm not even a human being. I'm a clock to ask, 'What time is it?' I'm a satellite guide to answer, 'What number is theDisney Channel?' I'm a car to order, 'Right around 5:30, please.'

I was certain that these were the hands that once held books and the eyes that studied history and the mind that graduated summa cum laude - but now they had disappeared into the peanut butter, never to be seen again. She's going, she's going, she's gone!?

One night, a group of us were having dinner, celebrating the return of a friend from England. Janice had just gotten back from a fabulous trip, and she was going on and on about the hotel she stayed in. I was sitting there, looking around at the others all put together so well. It was hard not to compare and feel sorry for myself. I was feeling pretty pathetic, when Janice turned to me with a beautifully wrapped package, and said, 'I brought you this.' It was a book on the great cathedrals of Europe. I wasn't exactly sure why she'd given it to me until I read her inscription:
'To Charlotte, with admiration for the greatness of what you are building when no one sees.'

In the days ahead I would read - no, devour - the book. And I would discover what would become for me, four life-changing truths, after which I could pattern my work: No one can say who built the great cathedrals - we have no record of their names. These builders gave their whole lives for a work they would never see finished. They made great sacrifices and expected no credit. The passion of their building was fueled by their faith that the eyes of God saw everything.

A legendary story in the book told of a rich man who came to visit the cathedral while it was being built, and he saw a workman carving a tiny bird on the inside of a beam. He was puzzled and asked the man, 'Why are you spending so much time carving that bird into a beam that will be covered by the roof, No one will ever see it. And the workman replied, 'Because God sees.'
I closed the book, feeling the missing piece fall into place. It was almost as if I heard God whispering to me, 'I see you, Charlotte. I see the sacrifices you make every day, even when no one around you does. No act of kindness you've done, no sequin you've sewn on, no cupcake you've baked, is too small for me to notice and smile over. You are building a great cathedral, but you can't see right now what it will become.

At times, my invisibility feels like an affliction. But it is not a disease that is erasing my life. It is the cure for the disease of my own self-centeredness. It is the antidote to my strong, stubborn pride.

I keep the right perspective when I see myself as a great builder. As one of the people who show up at a job that they will never see finished, to work on something that their name will never be on. The writer of the book went so far as to say that no cathedrals could ever be built in our lifetime because there are so few people willing to sacrifice to that degree.

When I really think about it, I don't want my son to tell the friend he's bringing home from college for Thanksgiving, 'My Mom gets up at 4 in the morning and bakes homemade pies, and then she hand bastes a turkey for three hours and presses all the linens for the table.' That would mean I'd built a shrine or a monument to myself. I just want him to want to come home.
And then, if there is anything more to say to his friend, to add, 'You're gonna love it there.'

As mothers, we are building great cathedrals. We cannot be seen if we're doing it right. And one day, it is very possible that the world will marvel, not only at what we have built, but at the beauty that has been added to the world by the sacrifices of invisible women.

Time for Another Update

Jump Rope for Heart



First off, as another thank you to those who donated, Miciah's Kindergarten class got an icecream sundae party for being the highest money raising class for Jump Rope for Heart. I happened to be in there that day as a parent helper, and the kids were SO EXCITED. One of the kids said, "This is the best day of my life!" And it only seemed fitting that I was there that day, since the teacher told me that the class raised something like $260. Which means Miciah raised all but $10 or $20 of that amount. So, Hurray for Miciah!

And if you're wondering, like I was, why an ice cream party was the reward for a healthy thing like jump roping, the teacher said that the original prize was a Subway party. But they probably didn't anticipate a Kindergarten class winning. The teacher approached the administration and said, "These kids don't care about sandwiches. How about an ice cream party instead?" So they changed it and man, it was fun to watch how excited they all were.



Elijah Turns 4!


Last Sunday was Elijah's 4th birthday! He was very excited for his "birthday party". Not a party at all, just 3 families: R & C, the B's (A's his best bud), and the S's (A is his other good friend). A few weeks ago, Elijah was looking through a birthday catalog that we get from time to time. He opened to the Spider-Man page with the cake, decorations, toys, etc. and said, "Mom, this is your recipe." It was cute. He was especially particular about having the cake. So I figured I'm make him a lame Spider-Man cake with a drawn on web and I'd put one of his Spider-Man dolls on top. But starting a few days before his birthday, he started talking about all the Spider-Man stuff he would have for his birthday. The cake, the pictures, and lots and lots of Spider-Man toys. We weren't even getting him a Spider-Man gift. We got him more Thomas train track.

I went to the store on Saturday and decided to check out the Spider-Man toys, too, since he was so set on them. I found a fun Spider-Man cell phone. He loves phones. He loves Spider-Man. So I got it for him. I hasn't let it out of his sight since, and he's even taken it to bed with him. Cute. And then last minute on Sunday I printed some Spider-Man pictures off the internet for his card and some pictures for the wall. He was thrilled with it all. I was anticipating him being pretty upset that there wasn't enough Spider-Man stuff, but he seemed to think it was perfect. Yea for that!

Here are some images: of the cake

(the dolls on top are red Spider-Man and black Spider-Man fighting with each other (Elijah refers to them as red and black Spider-Man. Red is always good. Black is always bad. He's never seen the 3rd movie, but he knows that the black one is bad. And he always has to be red Spider-Man when he's playing. I get to be the black one) and Elijah opening gifts.

Teancom Stories

Elijah had a few nights in a row where he was waking up every night and complaining about his ear. We took him in to the doctor and she said he has a mild ear infection. We figured it couldn't be too bad because he's been acting okay during the day. He'll just wake up in the middle of the night complaining about his ear. He's on antibiotics now. On one of the nights he was up, both boys kept each other awake for a full 3+ hours. Nice. That night was funny, though, because I brought Teancom in to bed with us to try to get him to go to sleep. It ultimately didn't work, but I gave him some kisses on his face and he took his fingers out of his mouth and gave me a kiss back. If you haven't seen Teancom give kisses, it's dang cute. And they're not the open mouthed gross baby kisses. He puckers up and plants them gently. So cute. So I said, "Okay, you're cute." He said, "Cute," back to me. And I told him that it wasn't fair for him to be charming at 3 in the morning. That kid totally has us wrapped around his finger and he knows it.

I have decided that I am one of those parents I vowed never to be. I am totally and completely enamored with Teancom. When I talk to people, I talk about how cute he is and how blah blah blah blah he is. I thought that being in love like this should be a choice. Nope. He is addictingly cute and cuddly and I'm hooked. So, sorry about gushing over him. It's just so easy to do!! So now I am one of those annoying gushing parents and I roll my eyes at myself even while I gush.

A story about Teancom. The other day he got out our sifter and was, for some reason, licking it. Rob looked down at him and said, "Teancom, that's pretty gross. How about you put that back?" So he immediately walked back to the cabinet, calmly put it back and went to find something else to play with. Isn't that amazing? I remember all the fighting and struggling and battle of wills I have had with my other 2 children. Teancom is just weird.

At Elijah's party, Teancom found a piece of clear plastic to play with. I didn't think much of it until Dustin Brown, sitting on our couch, starts laughing hysterically. We all stopped talking and Teancom is over there, smashing his face into the plastic to make Dustin laugh. So we got out the camera. You can see what Teancom's doing better in the close-up, but I like the other picture better because you can see Dustin in a full laugh, and that's what made the situation the most funny.

... I wrote everything up till this line last week and I can't get into the groove with everything else I was going to say, so I'm going to cut this off, send some pictures, and try again with another e-mail.

Tamra

Finally an Update

It's been a month since my last update. That seems like a long time to me, especially since we had Christmas and New Years in there! So here's our family update.

It seems like December was a long month in some ways, and just not long enough in other ways (like prep time for Christmas--can you ever have enough prep time?). At the start of December we decided on 2 things. The first was that we were going to go up early to Rob's parents' house and surprise them and B and G who were going to be there by themselves for a few days. We thought it'd be a lot of fun. The second thing we decided was to make a board game for C. Between fastforwarding our Christmas prep time and spending 50 hours making that board game, the week before Christmas was STRESSFUL!!!!!! We got little sleep and spent every available minute getting things done so we could leave Sunday to go to P.

Long story short, the board game turned out pretty cool. We're proud of it, anyways. We have yet to make a second game board (for us, of course), but we'll get to it. We won't try to pull it off the week before Christmas, though.

And going up to P on Sunday actually ended up working really really well. We had told V over Thanksgiving that we would be coming up early, but had let it be a surprise to everyone else. I actually was telling at least 1 lie to everyone involved with the Thacker Christmas. For an entire month. Anyways, when we arrived on Sunday, V was just as surprised as everyone else to see us. He'd forgotten. :) So it was fun to pull off a complete surprise.

Our surprise showing prompted Rob's sisters and their families to join us earlier than they had planned, too. They came up Christmas Eve late in the night and surprised Rob's parents. That was fun, too. We got both surprises on video.

Christmas morning was HUGE. None of us had huge Christmases, but when you combine them all, there were a TON of presents under this huge tree. The tree was cut out of their backyard and was something like 15 feet tall. We took pictures of it with the presents underneath. But I'll have to download the pics off Rob's laptop, so the pictures will have to come a little later. I'm behind, what can I say.

My favorite gift was the one we got from B. Everyone should e-mail him and ask him what it was. My second favorite gift was a freezer from my Mom. I really like having a freezer downstairs. Yea for freezer space! After that it was probably the Transformers special edition movie (the special features of how they did the special effects. Simply awesome), and two coloring books from J. Not for my kids, for Rob and me (he gave the kids their own). One is Color Your Own Abstract Art Masterpieces. The other is Color Your Own Van Gogh Paintings. They give you the outlines and let you color it yourself. How cool is that?!!

Santa and Rapunzel

So that was Christmas. A cute story about Christmas. Miciah only asked Santa for 2 things: The Barbie as the Island Princess movie, and the cereal, too. That's it. Easy enough. She asked us for the REST of the Barbie movies. :) We got her some, including the Rapunzel movie that she'd lost (we have the cover, but not the disc inside) months ago. When we were wrapping the gifts, Rob decided to wrap the Rapunzel movie as a Santa gift and he wrote a little note on it from Santa saying, "This is to replace the one you lost." We left the rest of the Barbie movies we bought at home to open when we got back. So on Christmas Eve in Toledo, at bedtime, Miciah said to Rob, "Daddy, I thought of something else I wanted to ask Santa for." Rob explained that it was pretty late to ask Santa for anything, but what was it. She said, "I want to ask him for a new Rapunzel movie to replace the one I lost." Rob repeated that it would be pretty hard to do at this point. She said, "Maybe Santa could put a chimney in a store and go buy one!" So you could imagine how magical it was when Miciah got the Rapunzel movie from Santa on Christmas morning. And I don't care if you like/believe in Santa or not, that IS pretty magical.

A funny end note to the story: When Miciah told her cousin, A, about getting the Rapunzel movie, and she showed it to her, A said, "We have that at our house." :) Turns out that the missing movie has been safely recovered at the S house. We told them that they could keep it. We'd even give them the cover for it. Merry Christmas to all.

7th Anniversary

Our anniversary was on the 21st. Rob and I celebrated 7 years together. It's been an interesting 7 years, with so many changes for both of us (3 kids, college, grad school, etc.). This last year has been one of the hardest of our marriage, but all I can say is that if that's the hardest it gets, we're safe. Let us pray the fates will not start a competition to see which year can be worse. :) I was exhausted for our anniversary date, so we cancelled other plans and Rob made me a cute dinner at home. Our 3 kids were being watched overnight by 2 families (it pays to have friends). You'd think we'd use the time to stay up late together doing something romantic. What did we do? First, after dinner I took a nap (no joke). Then we watched a chick flick while we finished wrapping Christmas gifts on the living room floor. Before all that, Rob had cleaned the house for me. And that's what the culmination of 7 years of marriage looks like--skip the romance, give me something practical: a nap, a clean house, and finishing the presents.

Rob did give me something really really cute. Before the dinner he sent me on a treasure hunt. I was tired and hungry and half annoyed that he wouldn't let me eat yet, but it was cute. At a few steps I discovered something he had set out for the night: my wedding dress (he wore his tux and I wore my dress for our dinner), our traditional sparkling cider and cheesecake. Then, the last clue lead to the big flower pot that was sitting out in our garage for the winter. I was pretty annoyed at this point, actually, that he'd made me go outside (insanely tired and hungry Tamra is not a docile creature). And then he buried the treasure. Except I'd missed that it was "treasure" I was digging for. I thought I was digging for another clue. He'd printed out the clues on a strip of paper about 1/2 inch in height and folded in fourths. I thought I was outside, digging in the flower pot with a shovel, in the middle of winter, to find another clue!! I was mad (I mean, seriously, can you visualize what I thought was happening?). Rob told me to read the clue again, it said I was digging for treasure!

The treasure turned out to be a blue topaz necklace (December's birthstone) with matching earrings. I actually really really like the color. It's a color that I wear all the time as an accent color. I have shirts that are that color. And the birthstone for December (when our marriage was born)--that's just cute. So it was a lovely night.

New Years Eve

New Years Eve was crazy. We have hosted the world's smallest New Years Eve party for a few years running. I think this was our last year for a while. I think I'm a little burned out. Though we may transition it to a New Years Day party. We spent New Years Day with the T's at our house playing the Wii. Convinced us that someday we would like to own one. We put it on our wish list. Miciah asked if we could get one next Christmas. I told her maybe. Then she said, "I'll sell some of my toys to get one." :) Even if she was willing to do that, I have doubts that she owns a saleable $300 in toys.

This last Friday the youth group at church did their non-NYE party. In the past they've done a New Years Eve party, but it got to be a hassle, and the new bishop thinks NYE is a family holiday (go figure), so they switched it to the Friday after NYE. Genius! It was a lot of fun. We played ping-pong, volleyball, and pin guard (a game the Scouts play a lot--kind of a dodgeball type of game), and ate pizza and chips and other goodies. It was fabulous fun. Again, another date night with the kids being watched overnight by friends. Yea for friends!! We watched their kids later on Saturday night, so it worked out well.

Our Furnace, A Saga

Saturday we got a furnace technician to come look at our furnace that we'd been thinking was going to burn down our house. For the last few months it was been exploding. That's the best way to describe it. Like it had an overabundance of gas and then it would do a very loud, chest-rumbling bang, and then the fire alarm would go off for a few seconds. Miciah was downstairs to see it once (she's the only one that's seen it at the time it does it) and she described to Rob that the flame came out about a foot and a half. Scary. Anyways, the guy came and checked it out. He cleaned the starters (is that what they're called?) off. Said usually the problem is from one of them being dirty and them not lighting evenly, so the gas keeps turning on. Then he turned down our gas pressure which he said was way too high (who knows these things?). Before he came, every time the furnace came on, whether it exploded or not, it would do this click, click, click sound. Many times. And since Saturday, I haven't even noticed my heater coming on. Yea for non-burned down houses!!

This is a long update. Clearly I haven't written for a while.

Avatar

Our family has been enjoying watching Season 2 of Avatar. C loaned us all the movies (in exchange for a Transformers borrow), and we've been watching those for the last week. It's a fun show. Miciah now talks to her friends about bending, and Elijah likes to pretend he's Aang, the Avatar. He'll come up to me and say, "Mom, I'm the Avatar. 'WHERE'S APA?'" That's a direct quote from chapter 11.

The Kids

Miciah and Elijah are cute as siblings. They alternate between loving each other dearly and bugging each other deeply. :) A fun story from a few days ago. Miciah was sitting on the couch and Elijah was standing in front of the couch. Miciah did something that Elijah didn't like. Suddenly, and with distress in her voice, Miciah said, "Elijah's trying to break down the house by breaking the couch!!" Rob and I stared at her in disbelief, without expression. She said matter-of-factly, "Really. He IS." SO funny. Then Elijah continued hitting the couch arm. Hard. Rob said, "Doesn't that hurt you?" Elijah said, "Not hurt my hand. Hurt the couch." :) Okay. He did explain to us that while he was trying to break the couch to hurt Miciah, Rob and I were not the object of his frustration and he wasn't trying to hurt us.

Elijah is a funny kid. While he can get really mad and somewhat aggressive, he rarely hurts others. He'll get mad and hit something else. He'll get mad and web you with his Spider-Man powers. But he usually doesn't hurt people.

Which reminds me of Christmas week's funniest story. Rob and I were playing racquetball, so the other adults were watching our kids. Elijah was standing in front of the TV so no one else could see. C asked him to move and for a little while he ignored her. She asked again and he turned around, like in slow-motion, glaring at her. He then, in the same slow-motion, brought out his web and webbed her. After they got done laughing, C picked Elijah up (because he still wouldn't move) and put him on the couch. He kept watching the show, but the whole time he kept his arm out towards C, webbing her, and he'd turn periodically to glare at her. :) That's just funny.

Teancom

Teancom is doing great. He is now walking near-exclusively, though he's still not incredibly stable on his feet. He has JUMPED in his verbal skills. Where before I couldn't think of 3 words he could say, he now says, "ma ma", "da da", "uh huh", "uh uh", "no", "here you go" (not that clear, of course), "please" (we can get him to say it occasionally), "thank you" (he says it often), "bye bye", "night night", "Cleo" (ee-oh), "Elijah", and "Leah" (his friend). So far Miciah doesn't have a name, that I can gather. He knows who Miciah is, but I've never heard him say her name. It's fun to have him so verbal, and it's very helpful! Yea for talking.

We took Teancom to nursery on Sunday for some transition time. He goes in officially the last Sunday of this month. He did great. I told Rob this and he said, "You're surprised?" No. He's just a good kid. He did get pushed over by one kid (there's a little boy who appears to have something out for Teancom. He's been picking on him for half a year or so), but no big deal. It got to clean up time. I thought he might be upset about putting his toys away. Nope. I asked him to put his car in a bin. He did it right away. He had a book. I asked him to give it to the leader. And he STOOD IN LINE behind 4 other kids with the book held up to give her. That blows me away. He's such a weird kid. He's quiet. He likes books. We can read him a full book. Not like a one-word-a-page book. A full easy reader book (like a Dr. Suess). Just so mellow. It occured to me while I was at nursery, that parents who only have kids like Teancom probably think that kids like Miciah and Elijah are monsters/broken and that parents of kids like Miciah and Elijah are awful parents!! It makes me grateful to have Teancom after the first two. It's not only a nice breather, but it's good perspective.

If you've read to this point, thank you for devoting the last hour of your life to reading my update. Your special reward is being mailed to you and you'll receive it in 1 - 6 weeks.

I'll try to get on top of sending out some of our cute pictures from the last few weeks!

We love you all and hope you all had memorable, lovely holidays!

Tamra, Rob, Miciah, Elijah, and Teancom

Another Short Update

I'm not sure when Miciah became a grown-up little kid, but she's now a big little girl. :) I've been looking through older photos, trying to see when this magic transformation took place. I can't pinpoint it, but it's happened.

We're counting down days until school starts. It never occured to me as a kid that my mom would be counting down days until school started. Never realized she would be so done with summer, just like the kids. ... Miciah and Elijah are at each other's throats all the time. Elijah is hyper beyond hyper and Miciah, I think, is annoyed that she never has any time away from her brother. ... I told Rob that tomorrow, not only do I need time away from my kids, but we either need to do something as a family, or he needs to take one of them away so they're not with each other all day. Rob likes doing "dates" with the kids. They like it, too. Rob has only done one other date with Elijah. He liked that it was just him. It's a fun concept for him that he might be able to do something that Miciah doesn't also do.

Quick Trip to CA - K Marries S!

Other than being kid stressed (it must be Friday) and ready for school already (is it really still 3 weeks away? ), things are pretty normal. Rob and I did have a fun weekend, though! Friday we flew out to California. We got into my parents' house at 4 in the morning Ohio time and crashed. They let us nap Saturday, thankfully. We helped my brother move back into his place Saturday morning. Sunday we had a fabulous day in Carmel on the beach for my other brother, K's wedding party. K married S and it was a fun party. I thought about how much my kids would have loved being there, but I'm glad we didn't take them. It was a late night Friday and then an early morning Monday to go back home.

Thankfully we have friends who like us, or at least like our kids. The S's have 2 kids the same ages as Miciah and Elijah, so we left our two older kids with them. They had a fun weekend, I think, and hopefully the extra kids weren't too much trouble. Then we found a couple with older kids. They're just starting to have grandkids, so they were more than happy to take Teancom. They love babies and when we went to pick him up they told us we were taking their buddy away! I was glad that Teancom was good (like normal) and that they enjoyed having him around. Their two boys at home (older teenagers), they said, were trying to teach Teancom how to walk. :) Cute. ... She also said that Teancom was such a good sleeper, she should have sent all her kids to me for their first year. I told her that if Teancom's sleeping was MY doing, I would have done the same trick on Miciah.

"I Am Not An Authority As a Parent"

Which brings up a good point about parenting. I have a phrase that I tell myself, and others, often about parenting: I am not an authority as a parent. It's roughly the same phrase as the one I've heard my parents and other say about how you can't take much credit or blame (though I realize there is some in parental responsibility) for what your kids decide to do, or for how they came. Had I had Teancom or even Elijah first, I probably would have prided myself for being a great mom. An excellent baby who sleeps through the night and doesn't cry ever. What a good job I must be doing! But, instead, we had Miciah first. And she taught me to use, and love, the phrase: I am not an authority as a parent. :) Miciah isn't a bad kid, never has been (though she wasn't a good baby, that's for sure), but she does things her way and always has, probably always will. That's great! And I am not an authority as a parent.

Life is good. Count down with me until August 22nd. First day of school!

Tamra and family

Being a Father

This is a talk that Rob gave in church last year for Father's Day. I wasn't there because it was the 5-week period I was in California with the kids. But he said it went pretty well. For this talk he didn't write everything out, he just wrote a sort of collected outline. So that's what follows:

Being a Father
Father’s Day 2007

Experiences/Stories of “Being a Father”

To start I asked myself the question of what being a father means. I looked up some conference talks and found some wonderful definitions and guidance on what it means to be a father. One in particular that I would like to quote from extensively is by L. Tom Perry titled “Fatherhood, an Eternal Calling.” I thought of just reading the talk and then after you were all amazed at the amount of work I had put into preparing, I was going to break the news that it was all borrowed. But I felt that it might be more meaningful if I just share a series of quotes.

Give quotes from talk.
1 - A family needs a father to anchor it.
2 - By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and ar responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families.
3 - The father is the head of the family. Fatherhood is leadership, the most important kind of leadership. It has always been so, it always will be so. Your leadership in the home must include leading in family worship.
4 - You preside at the meal table, at family prayer. You preside at family home evening; and as guided by the Spirit of the Lord, you see that your children are taught correct principles.
5 - You give father’s blessings. You take an active part in establishing family rules and discipline. As a leader in your home you plan and sacrifice to achieve the blessing of a unified and happy family.
6 - The father is a teacher. President Joseph F. Smith counseled us to “not let your children out to specialists, but teach them by you own precept and example. Be a specialist yourself in the truth.
7 - When you recognize the importance of teaching your children, you become humble, because at once you realize that this is accomplished by precept and example. You cannot be one thing and effectively teach another. You must live and study and pray for the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost. You must purify and organize your life so that your example and leadership reflect the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
8 - The father is the temporal provider.
9 - Fathers, by divine decree, you are to preside over your family units. This is a sobering responsibility and the most important one you will ever assume, for it is an eternal responsibility. You place the family in its proper priority. It’s the part of your life that will endure beyond the grave.
10 - Every father in the church should function as the patriarch of his home. He should take the lead in spiritually guiding the family. He aught not to delegate nor abrogate his responsibilities to the mother. He should call for family prayer, family home evening, scripture reading, and occasional father interviews. He is the protector, the defender, and the kindly source of discipline. It is the father who should lead, unify, and solidify the family unit by accepting the priesthood of God and responding to the calls and privileges associated with priesthood authority. His relationship with God and His Son, Jesus Christ, is one of the beacons which will lead his sons and daughters through the stormy shoals of life.
11 - On becoming a father: It is a mistake to think that a boy will learn about fatherhood later after having children. It is usually too late then if a boy has not learned successfully, and his sons and daughters will receive the brunt of his inadequacies. It is much wiser to think that men are better fathers when they have learned about it when they are sons.
12 - Most of us know that fathers should teach their sons, but most sons are not aware that they could and should learn about being fathers. As a result, boys often do not ask the very questions or participate in special experiences that could teach them. Boys may want their fathers to watch them play ball or teach them how to fish, but they forget to ask their dads how to be a good father. Sons could ask their fathers about many different aspects of family life including, financial planning, child discipline, organizing family activities, what you parents have learned as parents, what your parents think a feel about you, and how to teach the gospel to your children.
13 - Some men forget that their first priority should be to maintain their own spiritual and physical strength. Then comes their family, then the Church, and then their professions – and all need time.

Some experiences that help me understand what it means to be a father.
Being a father is:

Holding my new born child and understanding a little bit more how much my father in heaven loves me as one of his children.

Bearing my testimony to my infant as I look into his eyes and knowing somehow that he understands.

Feeling the weight of responsibility of leading my wife and children back to our Father.

Rejoicing in the many firsts of fatherhood. First crawl, first steps, first birthdays, first stitches, first father’s blessing, and finally the first time that my daughter turns to me and asks, “Dad, what does hypothesis mean?”

When my son gets a tie and he wears it so proudly, sits on my lap at church and says, pointing to the tie “Like you daddy”

My daughter makes me more I love you cards than I know what to do with, writes me a recipe book and provides me with a map of my house just because.

When I discipline my son and he demonstrates his anger by turning to me, pushing out his belly and yelling “Care Bear Stare.”

Being a father is saying hello to my youngest son and having him respond with the biggest smile. You know, one of those smiles only babies can give that include their entire body.

Putting my daughter to bed one night after a very long day and having her say, “Dad, if somebody cut off your arms and somebody cut off my arms, and then they put your arms on me and they put my arms on you we would look funny. You would look like a weird monster and I would look like a man. Isn’t that funny.”

Brothers and sisters. Grateful to be a father. After all, being a father is what God, our Father has chosen to be, and eternal parents is what he want us to become.