When Life Gives You Lemons

Today Ethan peed on the floor, on the couch, on a dining room chair, and one time when he flushed the toilet it completely overflowed, leaving poop infested water all over the bathroom. Marcus left the mop on the floor and I stepped on it, snapping it in two. (He is always getting out our mop and broom. Always meaning always, not just occasionally, frequently, or nearly every waking minute of the day. Always.) I had such plans for this today, and when things started to go wrong, I really wanted to call my sister to complain about life in general and have her tell me that it was going to be okay, I was doing a great job, yadda yadda yadda....

But instead, I told myself that I was going to make the best of things, so I toweled up the lake in the bathroom, Lysoled the floor, and went downstairs to build a fort with the kids. We had a blast! Then after dinner we made a huge mess of both the kitchen and dining room baking Hong Kong Egg Tarts for my family's Chinese New Year celebration tomorrow, and that was fun, too.

Girls Night 3, Berry Good Friends 'til the End

On Thursday Alyssa and I watched the very, very first episode of Strawberry Shortcake. We both love the Peculiar Purple Pie Man of Porcupine Peak. Ya ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ya ta ta ta - yeah!

Birthday Boy

A couple of weeks ago I asked Ethan what he wanted for his birthday. I think he inherited my taste buds, because his quick answer was, "cake." He didn't want just any cake, though, he wanted a "Lightning" cake, that is, Lightning McQueen. Any mention of any birthday over the next couple of weeks brought a question from Ethan: "Lightning cake?" Yes, Ethan, we'll get you a Lightning cake. He was very excited for that cake.


Ethan's birthday is today, but most of the celebrations took place yesterday. Brian came in Friday evening, and yesterday we had a relaxing morning and a very yummy breakfast. It had snowed a tiny bit over the night, and it was snowing while we were eating, so we decided to get geared up and go sledding. I think we took longer getting ready than we actually spent sledding, but we had a lot of fun. There was just enough snow, but other than a dad and son we were the only people on the hill. Ethan loves sledding! The minute he's at the bottom of the hill he says, "Again?" and starts walking up. He doesn't like to be pulled up to the top; he likes to walk all by himself, even though it takes a long time. He also wanted to pull the sled up one time, and he wanted me to get in so he could pull me up.



When we were done sledding we popped over to Dairy Queen to pick up the Lightning McQueen cake, then we went home to get ready for his party. We had both of our families over, including all of the Great Grandparents, except Grandma Harris. (She's from California, and doesn't like to go out in the cold.) We had a Hershey Kiss walk, and we played Pin the License Plate on Mater.


And then we ate the ice cream cake and a bunch of cup cakes. Ethan liked that part. A lot.

Then he opened presents, and the kids all played "Wack a Mole."


Ethan is the sweetest little guy. He is the perfect gentleman. He holds doors open for me, he says, "Yes, please," "No thanks," Thank you," "You're welcome," "Bless you," you name it. And he always (well, almost always) says, "Yes, Mom," or "Yes, Mommy" when I tell him to either do or not do something.

He loves cars (both the movie and in general) and train track sets. He's not into actual trains as he is into building the tracks.

Ethan is now just barely able to say his whole name. Up until yesterday is was "Ee - Nan," but now he's saying, "Eth - an." He's talking a lot now, although we can't always understand him. Sometimes it takes a few tries for us to be able to know what he's saying, but he's doing so good.

Ethan is definitely turning into a little boy. Everything he picks up is either a gun or a sword, and he loves to run around and play with his cousins, Derek and Asher.

Girls Night, Number 2

Last night we tried putting the boys to bed early, so Alyssa and I could have plenty of time to cut out lily pads with beautiful flowers for girls night. (That's what Alyssa wanted to do. I don't know why, but she did.) But the boys didn't fall asleep until 8:40, and Girls Night only lasts until 9:00, so we just read a Frog and Toad book together. We had a great time.

I'm seeing specific evidence at how important these girls nights are. This morning Alyssa is acting more grown up, and she's helping and listening more. It's so easy to forget that she needs this special time. She is so great, and I need to treasure her while she's still little.

Appearances Can Be Deceiving

He wasn't there tonight. Not a big deal. I did feel better about myself tonight, though. I didn't even have to give Alyssa the lecture, and she was very good. She made friends with other brothers and sisters who were there, and she had a great time. Marcus was actually interested in the toys tonight, up until he discovered that he could stand on top of the little table, so he was mostly good. Ethan, once again, loved his gymnastics class, and had wonderful time.

Things were going really well, then we headed to Alyssa's cheer leading class. At the beginning of class the teachers gave a lecture about being safe by not doing cartwheels and somersaults during class, unless they were told to. If they broke the safety rules, they would have to take a couple minutes break from class. Then they set up the girls by laying down their yellow circles on the ground and telling each girl, by name, to stand on a specific circle. All of the girls' circles were set up in a staggered fashion, about three or four feet apart. Alyssa's circle was on the very end, about seven feet away from the the group, because she's the one who's always doing the cartwheels and somersaults during class.

Alyssa did really well for the first half hour, and I chased the boys around the back of the room, trying to keep them occupied with hula hoops and train tracks, instead of brooms, snow shovels, and garbage cans. At 6:30, she started her carthweels, and was promptly taken out of class for a few minutes. She was given the choice to sit on the wall or back by me, and she chose to sit back by me so that she might persuade me to override her teachers' decision and let her back in class. While I was talking to her, trying to teach her (once again) about choices and consequences, Ethan disappeared into the bathroom and Marcus started running around with the broom. I was tired of getting looks from all of the other parents who were sitting there, not having to chase their children around the building, so I announced that we were going home.

So even though I tried to look the part of a great successful grown up, it didn't really work out in the end. Oh well.

Silly? Maybe

Last week we took Ethan to his first gymnastics class. Because he's turning three this week, he was able to be in the Kinderoo class for three and four year olds instead of the Toddleroo class for babies. He loved it. They had obstacle courses set up to take the kids through. They had a trampoline for the kids to jump on, ramps for them to roll down, and bars for them to hang from. It was fabulous for Ethan. Not so fabulous for me.

Alyssa is in a cheerleading class, which is perfect for her temperment and energy level. When she saw the older girls doing kartwheels on the balance beams and flipping around the uneven bars, she spent the entire forty-five minutes of Ethan's class begging to be put in gymnastics. I told her no, because we had just barely signed her up for this semester of cheeleading, but she conitued to beg. And Alyssa can beg. Boy, can she beg. Marcus wanted to be playing on the trampoline and ramps and bars with Ethan very bladly. He kept trying to run into the gymnastics area, and he would grunt and cry and scream every time I thwarted his attempts. Like I said, not so fabulous for me.

So at the end of the class, I was at the end of my rope. I hulded Marcus into my arms, started stuffing him into his coat, and grumpily ordered Alyssa to please stay in one spot so I could gather up the boys and all of our things. When I was finished zipping up Marcus' coat, I turned to tell Alyssa it was time for her to head to the front door while I waited for Ethan to be done, but she was gone. She was all the way over on the other side of the gym, watching flips and summersaults. I stomped to her side and started to pull her toward Ehtan's class (which was now letting him out), telling her to please put on her coat, stay with me, do not leave me again, listen to what I say, whydoesn'tshelistentomedoesn'tsheknowthatI'minchargewhattheheckamIdoingthisallforanyway?

I was in this fazzled, horrible state when I saw someone I recognized. I won't give his name, to save myself some embarrassment, but I'll tell you that I knew him from elementary school. He went to school with me all the way through graduation, I assume, but I didn't take huge note of him in elementary school and didn't take note of him much at all after that. I saw him sitting there, happily, with a cute little girl sitting on his lap. He was handsome, which surprised me a little. He had a "tail" on the back of his neck when he was a kid, which I found gross even back then, and here he sat, hair nice, clean shaven, handsome, and nicely dressed.

And there I was, toting three unruly kids around, yelling at them, and bumbling my way to the entrance. Granted, he probably didn't notice me, and if he did, I'm sure he didn't recognize me, and if by chance he did, he probably doesn't even care. And I don't know why I care. I'm happily married to a wonderfully handsome guy, so it's not like that. I guess it's just that when you see people from your past, even if they played a tiny, insignifigant role in that past, you want them to think the best of you. He was putting his best foot forward, which didn't seem all that difficult from looking at the well-behaved cutie on his lap, and I definitely was not.

So today I have my hair pulled up. I'm wearing makeup. I plan on wearing a cute shirt and some good shoes. I'm going to give Alyssa a lecture she'll never forget on the drive over. I'm going to go ahead and chase Marcus around and try to engage him with the toys, like I did last week, because there's not much I can do about him right now. I'm not going to do those things for this guy, but for me, really. For my confidence and self esteem. To prove to the world and the people of my past that I have grown up, that I can be beautiful and poised and put together. And even though it may be silly, hopefully it'll help me feel better than I felt last week. And then again, maybe it all doesn't even matter, anyway.

Let's Get it Started

I've got all of my charts up on the bulletin board so I can keep track of my goals. There's a Chapters of the Book of Mormon chart, the printouts from the 100 Push Up Challenge and the 200 Sit Up Challenge, and there will soon be a temple chart.

I've been keeping logs of Marcus' progress with sleeping, I just haven't put them into his blog. Last night he only woke up once, then another time I heard him call out, but he went back to sleep on his own. Yea!

I did the initial push up and sit up tests last night, too. I was proud of my eleven push ups (and those ain't girly push ups niether!) because when I did this in the fall I could barely do seven when I started. I was also proud of my thirty-three sit ups until I saw that it put me in the lowest category. I was trying to make sure that I did each sit up right, and I could probably have done more, but I didn't think I was doing quality sit ups at the end, and that's why I stopped. They're actually crunches, because realy sit ups aren't supposed to be good for you, but even then if you try to do crunches right (keeping the control in your body, holding for a second at the top) they can be pretty hard. Well, at least I have plenty of room for improvement!

Brian Jacks, Schmott Guy

Brian called this morning and said, "Guess which one of your husbands passed Boards?" Now the first question one might ask is, "How many husbands does she have?" and the next, "How many of them took Boards?" The answer to both of those questions is: one.

"Yea! Congratualtions! I knew you'd do great," I started, continuing with, "When did you find out? I'm so proud of you!"

To which Brian said, "It's me, by the way." So how many husbands does he think I have?

So Brian passed Boards! Yea-diddley-yea! He couldn't talk long, because he was getting ready for church, but he did say that there's a few sections in the test, and you don't have to pass all of them in order to pass, but he did pass them all! Yep, that's me bragging. He's a smart guy.

Just For You, Honey

Look what I've been doing today!



And here's the best part. Your Atwoods have their own special section all of their own. The rest I kind of organized, but you'll want to go through it all when you're here.


I put up a few more shelves (actually, I moved the ones from the play room into the storage room) and organized a little bit. Marcus helped a lot, which is one reason things are going slow. There's still a lot more to do, but I kind of lost my momentum when I had to put Marcus down for a nap and take a shower. But yea! for progress!

Heaven, All Wrappped Up in Chocolate

I love chocolate covered cherries. Brian knows this intimately. I made sure to drill it into his brain when we were first married, and now I seem to get them every year for Christmas. Queen Anne are my favorites. I know, they're just the ones you get from Winco, but I've tried more expensive, luxury versions, and they just aren't as good.

I love to eat the bottom off, and then you have a sweet little chocolate cup filled with creamy, sugary liquid and a nice plump candied cherry floating in the middle of it all. It's beautiful.

This year, Brian came home with a semi-large heavy box, which he wrapped, wrote my name on, and placed under the tree. But before he put it under the tree, he had me hold it and shake it to guess what it was. "Ten pounds of chocolate covered cherries," I joked, but from holding and shakng it, my guess was actually something ceramic-y, like a serving platter or something. I don't know why Brian would get that for me, but it's what it felt like.

On Christmas morning, when I opened that box I found fifteen boxes of Queen Anne chocolate covered cherries. Fifteen boxes! That's just over six pounds! I couldn't believe that I had been so close.

You can probably guess what we took to our New Years Eve party: a platter of chocolate covered cherries. And you can probably guess what I go for when I want to indulge in something wonderful after the kids have gone to bed and my husband isn't around: Heaven, all wrapped up in chocolate.

Girls Night

Alyssa and I are starting to have a Girls Night every Thursday after the boys go to bed. It's amazing how helpful a little girl can be in getting everyone ready for bed when she knows she's going to be able to have a party after the boys go to sleep! Girls Night lasts until 9:00, so the sooner we get the boys sleeping, the more time she has to have fun.

Tonight we put together a chore chart for her, because she's been asking about ways she can earn money. Her daily chores are making her bed and setting the table for dinner. And once a week she has to clean the dressing room mirror, take out the dressing room garbage, clean the bathroom sink, organize the bookshelf, and dust the piano.

It was so nice to have one on one time with Alyssa. She needs that extra attention sometimes. The boys still get extra loves because they're younger and they're home more than she is, and she needs that, too. I loved having her sit on my lap, picking out the pictures for her chore chart, and saying, "I love you so much."

Can I Do It?

I've never really done New Year's resolutions. I'm a very goal oriented person (ask Brian, it drives him nuts sometimes) so I never saw the point to setting goals once a year, because I'm always setting goals for myself. But right now there are so many things that I want to do or need to be done that I thought I would make it official.

• Teach Marcus to "sleep through the night." I am in some serious need of sleep. It's insane. I actually started a blog yesterday, just to help me keep track of it all.
  
• Complete the 100 Push Ups Challenge. Brian was doing it in the fall, and he had me give it a try, too. I only made it a week and a half, but it was fun so I want to give it a real try this time.
• Go on a vacation with Brian. We are very, very lacking in Brian and Carrie Alone Time. Even if it's just spending a day or two at his parent's cabin, it would be wonderful. We're also planning on going to Brian's best friend from college's wedding at the end of February (Brian's the best man!) and it would be great to be able to not take Marcus with us. That's also a good reason to get Marcus sleeping better.
  
• Go to the temple every month.
• Read the Book of Mormon on my own. Last year we actually finished it as a family, and that was fabulous! I'd like to go through it by myself this year, too.
• Put my blog (so far) into book form. I started formatting 2006-2008 a while ago, but I've never finished it. I'd also like to do 2008-2009.
• Edited to add: There's a 200 Sit Up Challenge, too. It looks like fun.
  

I thought there were a couple more that I was considering this evening, but I can't recall them now. I'll add more if I come up with them.

Oh, I might have changed my mind about making my blog private. I'm still deciding on that one.

For the Lovely Megan

My niece is hosting a movie quiz. So if you want to participate, don't look at my answers!

1. Cars
2. Emperor's New Groove
3. Princess Bride
4. I don't know
5. I don't know this one either
6. Toy Story 2
7. Finding Nemo
8. Animaniacs
9. Enchanted
10. I don't know

I Think It's About Time

Goin' private. Send me your emails if you want to be on the list.

A Picture, In Words

Right now Brian is rocking Marcus to sleep. He woke up just as we were headed to bed, and Brian offered to get him sleeping again. He held Marcus in his arms and rocked him back and forth until Marcus settled down and fell asleep. Standing in the dim light, holding and loving his son, Brian looks wonderful. He's at his handsomest when he's doing good things.

I wanted to take a picture, but that would probably wake Marcus, so I'm settling for words.

A Bit Full

Usually over the Holidays I eat more than the rest of the year. I eat what I want, I eat more than I should, but I usually don't eat too much. This year, I have eaten and eaten like never before. I've gone to bed each night thinking, I never want to eat another thing in my entire life! and then I wake up the next morning and say, "Wow! Food!" I'm glad all the shindigs are over with, so I can get back to eating better...and less.

There's a Dead Body in My Bath Tub

I'm cooking my first turkey today, and I'm so excited. It's a huge sucker that is taking forever to defrost, so we opted for the tub method last night.

In the picture is the rock Brian gave me, which I used to hold the turkey in the water.

Post Pity Party

So yesterday turned out to be a great day. (Sidenote: I found my fingers pausing while typing the word "great." When I talk to Brian on our Windows Live messenger, all of a sudden a couple of days ago, it's started to put a happy little grey ball man saying "Great!" every time I type the word, "great," and it bugs me.)

Marcus missed his morning nap, then he was threatening to go to sleep just before we had to take Alyssa to school. I didn't think he'd make it until then, so I called Brian's mom to see if she wanted to come sit with the boys while I took Alyssa. She couldn't, but she invited us over to their house instead.

We had a wonderful afternoon. Ethan played, Marcus and I took a nap (a glorious nap!), and we hung out for the rest of the day.

Pity Party - Boo Hoo For Me!

Okay, just give me a few minutes. I know things aren't as bad as they feel. I know it will get better. Everything's going to be okay, but I just want a couple of minutes to complain. Here goes:

I am tired! Two nights ago Marcus was up from 1:00 until 4:30. He wanted to go back to sleep, but for some crazy reason he couldn't. I tried nursing him, rocking him, walking him, laying him down in his crib, laying him down in bed with me...you name it. Yesterday Brian's mom offered to take the kids so I could take a nap, and I turned her down because at that point I was doing okay. Because of that night, last night was crazy. He was ready to go to sleep by five thirty when I was trying to clean up after dinner. Dinner didn't get cleaned up, and I was going to start getting him ready for bed, but because of craziness from some phone calls, a fed ex truck delivering our replacement cell phone next door, me not being able to find my old cell phone, and other things, he didn't get to bed until around 7:30 or 8:00. He was awake twenty minutes later. Ethan also didn't want to go to bed, and he was up and down and up and down.

So I watched an episode of "Pushing Daisies" (I'm really liking that) while rocking Marcus back to sleep. Ethan interrupted a couple of times, and one of those times he wanted a drink of water, even though he had had nearly ten (not an exaggeration) glasses of water just before bed, and he tried to drink his water laying down, which made it spill all around his neck, then I dried him off, flipped his pillow, and he fell asleep in about twenty seconds while crying. Once Marcus was asleep I paused "Pushing Daisies" and went to bed myself. And Marcus was up a lot last night. Nearly every hour. He went back to sleep okay each time, but still. This morning he woke up at 4:30, and I pulled him into bed with me. He fell asleep after a while, then woke up five minutes later, then Ethan woke up, then they both fell asleep, then Alyssa woke up from a bad dream, then she didn't go to sleep, but was at least quiet, then the cat licked my pillow, then all three kids woke up again. Not because of the cat licking my pillow...they just woke up.

When Brian was home last weekend he put Marcus to bed for me, and he did it in record time. The only reason Marcus is waking up all night is to nurse. His usual nights have him waking at 10:00, 12:00, 2:00, 4:00, and 6;00. He's just on a schedule to wake up and nurse. It stinks. He has no interest in nursing during the day. I've tried to nurse him more during the day so he won't want to nurse at night, but he's just not interested. When Brian comes home for Christmas he's going to be on Marcus duty each night, and hopefully that will fix things. If Marcus is still wanting to nurse all night at that point, it just may be time to wean him altogether, because I can't do this for much longer.

And speaking of Brian being home, I want my husband back! Seriously. I'm going to say that again with more exclamation marks. I really, really want my husband back!!! Wow. I wasn't expecting the really's to sneak in there. It stinks not having Brian here. If he was here then I could have had him take Marcus while I cleaned up after dinner. He could have helped me get the kids ready for bed. I'm trying to keep things clean, but our house gets to be such a disaster so quickly, because it's just me against the three kids, and they can make messes a lot faster than I can clean them. My mom and Brian's mom and my friend and visiting teacher have been helping me by taking the kids so I can go shopping, having us over for dinner, etc. I'm so thankful for that help, and I know I couldn't get through this time without it, but it's not the same as having Brian here. It's just not the same.

So today I think we're just going to recover from life. I'm going to finish the dishes, have the kids help me straighten the living room, then we're going to just bum around the house.

Practically Perfect, in Every Way

We had a wonderful weekend. We spent Saturday morning finishing up some baked goodies.

Marcus found the bowl of green frosting.

We made a mess of the kitchen.

But it was so worth it.

We went caroling around our street, which was so much fun. This was the first year that Alyssa was really able to join in. We sang "Silent Night" and "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" at each house, and when we were done singing Alyssa would run back to our house to pick up another plate of goodies. It was raining pretty heavily, and while we were out, the rain turned to snow. It was beautiful! I love to go caroling. This year, I loved seeing the excitement on Alyssa's face and getting to know our neighbors a bit better.

We went to dinner at Brian's parent's house. We hung out for a bit afterward, then got bundled up to go see the Boat Parade at Howard Amon Park. The couple of times we went when I was little, we never got out of the car, so this time we didn't bundle up as much as we should have. I figured we would drive over, watch the fireworks, get out to see Santa for a few minutes, then get back in the car to watch the boats go by.



Instead, we were running a bit behind, so we ended up parking across George Washington Way to see the fireworks. They were so cool! Fireworks are great, but when they're choreographed to music (as these were) they are super-super cool!

Since we were already parked, we went ahead and walked across the street to wait for the boats. It was 7:45, and the newspaper estimated that the boats would reach Howard amon Park around 7:00. So we rushed over, then waited in the cold with everyone else. We watied...and waited....and after a while we finally saw some lights coming down the river. The parade was 26 boats long, but we only lasted through 6 before we ran back to the car. Even though it was cold, it was still so much fun. It was...cold fun.

Brian took off early yesterday, because of the snow. We didn't want him traveling in the evening when it was more likely that the roads would be icey. He made it to Portland okay, and we're counting down the days until Christmas Eve, when we'll see him again.