A Little Tired?

Thursday after visiting teaching, we brought home one of Olivia's friends to play until it was time to get Elizabeth from school. While they were playing, I made lasagna and French bread for dinner. We fed the missionaries. I planned on making chicken and rice, but called them that morning to make sure of allergies or dislikes and happened to ask what they were fed this week already and he said they had chicken two or three times, so I decided not to make them eat chicken again. Olivia and her friend had a lot of fun and then it was time to take her friend home. Right after school, I had to drop Elizabeth off at her musical theater class and then go home to finish dinner stuff. Andy picked her up afterwards. Elizabeth made a salad and Olivia set the table. The missionaries loved it!
On the way home from dropping Elizabeth off (about 3:35pm) Olivia looked like this:
When I stopped at a stop sign, I looked back and she had straightened herself back up, but flopped down again after I started going again.Vincent looked like this. A little groggy from his nap still, but just hanging out. He may have been in a food coma. Looks like he finished his milk and set it aside.
Why was Olivia so tired, you ask? Maybe from all the playing on Thursday, but my guess is that the reason she was so tired is because she and Elizabeth wouldn't go to sleep on Wednesday night when we were having our weekly game night. They stayed up until almost 11pm (playing in their room, of course.) The last time I went to check on them and told them what I would take away Thursday, Elizabeth said, "Torrie egged us on!" as her excuse. Nice try, Elizabeth. Torrie denied all wrong-doing.

Bird viewing

Saturday we went to Walla Walla to visit my parents and to go to a wedding reception for someone in our ward who married a lady who served as a missionary in Walla Walla.
We visited with my parents, I unloaded the finishing of my quilt on my mom. She did offer to do the quilting on it for my birthday, so I'm letting her do the borders too. She blogged about our visit here.
My dad took the kids to the park to look at birds in the aviary.
The kids on the walk by the canal. Thank goodness for a big fence!I sent the camera with Elizabeth to take some pictures of their adventures. She likes to take pictures. I cropped some of them and deleted others that had her finger covering the picture or were blurry, but I'm impressed with a few of them, so here they are.
They found a doggie on the way there and a few more while they were there. They came back smelling like little dogs.
Some birds.I think I like this one for the Reflections contest for next year. The theme is "Together We Can".
They watched a peacock that wouldn't open it's feathers.They found a shoe in the duck pond. Can you see it?
Elizabeth even sees beauty in the weeds.After the reception, we went to dinner and then my parents took the girls to Ransom Road in Walla Walla so my mom could take a picture.
When we got back to my parent's house, the kids (and grandpa) were SO tired. See? Oh, and I need to take a new picture of Elizabeth's mouth. She is missing the two middle top teeth and two on the bottom just to the side of the middle ones. She has lost six teeth now. She can't eat an apple anymore without it being cut up. She might just break the Tooth Fairy's bank.

This is Mellow for us.

This week has been pretty mellow. School, finding babysitters, errands, and all that, but only one meeting for me to go to in the evening which has made the whole week feel so much less busy.
Monday morning I helped in Elizabeth's class and then we hung out at home the rest of the day. I have been babysitting a friend's daughter three afternoons a week, so she takes a nap until her mom brings Elizabeth home and picks her own daughter up. It works out pretty well. I made some yummy peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and froze part of the dough. Another friend came over to play with Olivia for a little while too. I was crabby after fighting with the kids to eat their dinner, so I took a nap and Andy did FHE with them and put them to bed.
Tuesday Olivia had ballet and Vincent and I went to use the Albertson's coupon doublers. By the way if you get the newspaper and don't want your coupons, I would LOVE to use them for you. Andy decided that he needed to write on the calendar when he planned on working on the house projects during the week, so he wrote on the next several Tuesdays to do that. Andy worked on the family room ceiling. I took the kids outside and worked on the garden. I hadn't planted or done anything yet, except we did dump a bunch of leaves and grass clippings in there. Normally we rototill the garden because we inherited a rototiller from Andy's uncle, but the tires are flat and so I just raked all the top stuff to the back of the garden and I'm calling it the compost pile (or something). Elizabeth helped with raking for the first part while I weeded and Olivia and Vincent blew bubbles and went down the slide. After I finished pulling the weeds, I took over the rake and Elizabeth worked on a few of the stubborn weeds that broke off. I used the hoe to make some rows to put the seeds in. Elizabeth helped me plant the cucumbers and cantaloupe and her sunflower she grew at school and then Olivia helped me with the lettuce and peppers. We already have strawberry plants and tomatoes usually will grow on their own. I'm going to give the tomatoes another week to pop up before resorting to the store tomato starts.
Here's what it looks like now. It was a dog kennel when we moved here, so it has a nice big fence separating it from the yard, which I'm sure has saved many plants from being picked before their time.
Olivia had preschool Wednesday and Vincent and I went to the library for story time. He was funny answering the questions. It was the baby storytime and he is more than two, so the librarian would ask what an animal was and the noise it makes and he would answer. Of course the other kids were all too little to answer, but I didn't have anything else to do during preschool and didn't want to go home and then go back out to pick her up. Wednesday night I had a PTA planning meeting for the coming school year. We had to figure out the budget and the review the standing rules so they can be approved at the next meeting. It was during game night, so I showed up home late for that and joined in on the last three hands of spades. I got all of my bids and ended up in second place (In our house, when you join late, you take the worst score and work your way up or down.) My former print shop boss, Bob, called Wednesday afternoon to see if I wanted to do some binding at home. He brought it over and I worked on it Wednesday and Thursday nights. He brought more Friday afternoon to work on over the weekend.
Thursday we had nothing planned, so I read the book group book, "Boyd K. Packer: A Watchman on the Tower" and then we were lazy until it was time to pick up Elizabeth and take her to her musical theater dance class, but I did start the pizza dough, so I could make dinner when we got home. I took Olivia and Vincent to the grocery store during her class because it's close. Andy went and picked up some parts to fix the fence that broke while I finished making the pizza.
Here are some mini roses blooming today. I love roses!Friday morning was a Volunteer Appreciation Breakfast at the school that the teachers and principal did for us. They had the kids' choir come and sing for us. They sang a thank you song and "Don't Worry, Be Happy". I especially like the latter one because I sang it in Sunshine Generation when I was little and that is one of the few music videos I've seen from those three months as a kid when we had cable. We taped everything and that was one of the things we watched over and over. Olivia and Vincent played all morning until his naptime. I read/napped during my book. I was really tired from staying up to work on binding the books and getting up early for the breakfast. The book is excellent and I finished it this afternoon. Tonight Andy and I are going to the Temple and I'm so excited. My goals have not been going all that well this year so far and this is the first time this year we have been able to go together. I did go once in April with a friend, but it's so much nicer to go with Andy. I love going. After the Temple, we are trying out a new restaurant. Tomorrow we are finally going to haul away the dead tree branches (see broken fence link above) and then go to Walla Walla to see my parents and to go to a reception. Fun stuff.

My birthday wishes

A little early...
I decided that I should make a list for my birthday because every year as it gets closer, I forget what I want when people ask. I'm not saying that I need presents from you, just writing down what I want/need.
1. Cell phone (Andy's in charge of that.)
2. New CTR ring. Ring size 10.
3. Nice black pants. I might just need someone to shop with me to tell me if they look nice.
4. Chick flick with the girls.
5. Laptop. (This is probably not going to happen until the current computer dies.)
6. A few more black Creative Memories books with extra pages and plastic covers to scrapbook. I use the 8 1/2 x 11.
7. Pegboard so I can finish a headboard for our bed (I've only been planning it for years....)
8. Some home improvement projects finished. (family room ceiling, bathroom fan, garbage disposal, etc.)
9. Victoria Secret Very Sexy Perfume (Sounds funny, but it is the best smell! One of Andy's sisters bought it for me years ago.)
10. Lunch at Olive Garden with group of friends or family.
I already ran out of ideas. Man, I'm so not good at this. I'd better practice more.

R.I.P.

So our second journey into fishdome is over. One fish called it quits two nights ago and we found the second one floating this morning. The bowl is now empty. Guess our house is too cold or the shift from the school to home was too abrupt (or they were shaken up too much). Who knows? Oh well. Guppies are guppies.
In other news, I've been letting Elizabeth go down our road on her scooter to the corner while I'm in the front yard and she met a girl a few houses down yesterday who is five and will go to their school with Olivia next year. We all had to go down to meet them. Very interesting that people can live so close without noticing each other. It's much easier to just make friends with neighbors on each side, across, and maybe kitty-corner.
Last night was Olivia's Kindergarten Readiness meeting at the school to meet the teachers and see the classrooms and school. As if she's never seen the school before... Anyway, one of the teachers read a story to the kids and then gave them each a copy of it. Olivia was interrupting the story several times to ask about the bowl of suckers on a shelf. I counted three times during the story and two after the story. She is one persistent kid. She answered questions about the story too, but would not be redirected. She had a lot of fun at the school and we saw about a dozen kids who will be in her grade that she already knows.
Vincent gets to go with Andy for the Father-Son campout with our ward tonight. Andy is really excited to haul all of Vincent's gear to the place for one night and can't wait until Vincent doesn't need so much stuff.
I guess that means the girls and I will have a Mother-Daughter night. Maybe we'll go to Kohl's and JoAnn's. Yep. Sounds like a plan.

Addition, Elephant, Picnic

In this blog (if you read it) you will learn about our new addition, the elephant that broke the camel's back, and a picnic.
This is one of my roses about to bloom.Today I was in charge of preschool, so I got the little coloring pages ready and figured out what I wanted to do with the letter "X" and numbers 16-20 to review. I thought about making a cool treasure hunt where the letter "X" marks the spot, but didn't think of it until too late and decided that I didn't really want eight kids trashing my house to find the letter "X". Good choice, I think. Instead they colored, traced, and then each made a popsicle stick "X" and used their pretzel sticks to make a bunch of different letters, including X. I told them to guess the letter that each of them were making. They liked it. The numbers part ended up being counting their pretzel sticks. The most exciting part of the whole time was as soon as they all came, I had them sit on the blue couch and get ready for me to read them a few books with X in them. (Sounds really exciting, huh? Just wait.) I sat down on the coffee table across from them and the glass on top of the table totally broke. It was so loud. I ushered the kids to the family room then to do their coloring while I cleaned up the glass mess. At least it didn't break under Vincent last night when he was standing on it...
Nice huh? Guess we'll be getting rid of this. Anyone want a coffee table without the glass? For that matter, comment soon if you want scraps of glass.Tuesday after school it was so nice outside (nice enough all day that I wore my capris) that the kids wanted to play and play and play. About a half hour after we went inside, we heard it raining and thundering. Elizabeth decided it would be fun to have a little picnic, so she went and got the things needed for that and brought them out.Vincent was learning how to ride Olivia's old trike. His is still inside. We'll bring it out soon. He was pretty good at it and even stayed out of the road.Elizabeth loves to ride her scooter. We've got to get her on a bike better this year.
I read parts of my book outside until Andy got home and then made our taco dinner.
I'm reading the "Henry Huggins" book to the girls at bedtime. I plan on getting through all of Beverly Cleary's books with them. They are fun books and the girls are very interested in Henry's stories.
Elizabeth came home with her two guppies from her class on Monday afternoon, so we got our little fish bowl ready and waited for the water temperature to be right before putting them in.
They are in the middle/bottom of the bowl almost looking straight forward.We made a trip to the pet store as our FHE activity to buy a new thermometer and looked at all the rats and things that WILL NOT enter my house. They are fun to watch, but they smell so bad and make me sneeze, plus I always have the excuse of my dad being allergic to pet hair and tell the kids that he wouldn't be able to come over if we had one. Good thing they like him. =)
That's what's happening here. I've been trying to slow May down. The calendar isn't too full yet, which has been nice.

Happy Day?

My day didn't start out all that well. I wrote a poem about it when I was mad.
Here is the poem. I didn't think I would post it, but now that I'm not so moody, I think I will.

To the tune of Happy Birthday, kind of.
By NaDell Ransom
Happy Mother's Day to me!
Kids fighting. Yippee!
Did my mom wish this on me?
She did, yes, sirree.

Can't wait to go to church
Pretend I'm not a lurch.
Wear a fake little smile.
And go the extra mile.

Make others Happy.
Don't be grumpy.
So glad I'm a mommy.
Can't wait 'til next year!

Yeah, so Andy got the kids all bathed and everything, but I woke up to the girls fighting or talking really loud over something. I hate waking up to fighting. SO not fun.
We did all make it to church where I was still kind of grumpy. One friend's talk was great. She said her Mother's Days became a lot better when she figured out that her kids weren't going to be perfectly behaved, even on Mother's Day. At least I got out of my funk a little then. The Young Men's and Young Women's took over the Primary today, so I went down to the nursery to make sure it was all going alright before leaving Andy and the grandma lady down there with six youth and 10 kids. They had a fun time. I went to Relief Society. I was early and got to visit with the lady next to me who is so inspiring and great. I totally confessed that I was grumpy in the morning and wrote a poem. She is amazing and made me feel better. Then our lesson was fantastic and helped me out. I haven't been able to go to Relief Society since we started down in the nursery last September, so it was great to go and be with all of them again. I really love it there. I left SO much happier than I went to church.
Picture from Los Angeles Temple Grounds.
After church, we went to the hospital to visit Andy's Grandma Ellen, who is recovering from some hip infection or something. The kids enjoyed going to visit her and I think she liked seeing them all dressed up too.

Elizabeth made dinner. She mixed up a fruit salad with fruit cocktail from the can and marshmallows. I didn't have whipped topping, so it was just that. Then she put some carrots in a bowl and set the table. I decided that probably wasn't enough so I got out some cheese and crackers to add to it. Food groups-covered, except for meat.

I think I must set myself up to have a crummy mother's day at church because of my first one as a mommy. Elizabeth cried the ENTIRE time. She was just a few months old and I spent the whole time in the mother's room trying to figure her out. I didn't even get the flowers or candy or whatever they gave all the moms in Sacrament meeting.

Anyway, now I'm better today. I AM glad I'm a mom. I'm grateful for my mom and grandma and Andy's mom and grandma as well. I'm also grateful for those moms who I'm friends with and all they inspire me to be.

Fire Station Preschool

Olivia's preschool went to the fire station this week, as you may have guessed from the title.
We have seven kids in our mommy swap preschool, so each of us take a week and switch around, so everyone has a chance to teach. It's fun that way and you don't have to teach until another six weeks go by (dependent on who has babies and needs a longer break or if you switch with people because you go out of town). Each of us was also in charge of a field trip. We made plans to go to an apple orchard which didn't turn out because the weather didn't cooperate, to the nursing home that I planned at Christmastime, to the Children's Museum, to the fire station, to the middle school for music, and soon to the park for preschool graduation.
The seven preschoolers and three siblings.The fire fighter captain had one of the volunteers put on his real outfit to show the kids that it wasn't scary and told them not to hide if they ever saw him. Vincent liked it. I think he went up and gave him a hug or something.Most of the kids weren't scared of him, but one was. She needed a little extra coaxing.
They showed us where the firemen go to watch TV and the kids found some toys. Vincent went straight for this huge gun. He was protective of it too.Andy's aunt was married yesterday afternoon. I took this picture just after the ceremony when people were blowing bubbles. We are so happy for Nancy and Dewey! They moved into a house in our ward, so that will be really fun too.

Happy Mother's Day!

Here is a great little story about mothers because it is Mother's Day.

A woman, renewing her driver's license at the County Clerk 's office, was asked by the woman recorder to state her occupation.
She hesitated, uncertain how to classify herself.
"What I mean is," explained the recorder, "Do you have a job or are you just a --?"
"Of course I have a job," snapped the woman. "I'm a Mom."
"We don't list 'Mom' as an occupation, 'housewife' covers it," said the recorder emphatically.
I forgot all about her story until one day I found myself in the same situation, this time at our own Town Hall. The Clerk was obviously a career woman, poised, efficient, and possessed of a high sounding title like, 'Official Interrogator' or 'Town Registrar.'
"What is your occupation?" she probed.
What made me say it? I do not know. The words simply popped out. "I'm a Research Associate in the field of Child Development and Human Relations."
The clerk paused, ball-point pen frozen in midair and looked up as though she had not heard right.
I repeated the title slowly emphasizing the most significant words. Then I stared with wonder as my pronouncement was written, in bold, black ink on the official questionnaire.
"Might I ask," said the clerk with new interest, "Just what you do in your field?"
Coolly, without any trace of fluster in my voice, I heard myself reply, "I have a continuing program of research, (what mother doesn't)
In the laboratory and in the field, (normally I would have said indoors and out). I'm working for my Masters, (first the Lord and then the whole family)
and already have four credits (all daughters). Of course, the job is one of the most demanding in the humanities, (any mother care to disagree?)
and I often work 14 hours a day, (24 is more like it). But the job is more challenging than most run-of-the-mill careers and the rewards are more of a satisfaction rather than just money."
There was an increasing note of respect in the clerk's voice as she
completed the form, stood up, and personally ushered me to the door.
As I drove into our driveway, buoyed up by my glamorous new career, I was greeted by my lab assistants -- ages 13, 7, and 3. Upstairs I could hear our new experimental model, (a 6 month old baby) in the child development program, testing out a new vocal pattern. I felt I had scored a beat on bureaucracy! And I had gone on the official records as someone more distinguished and indispensable to mankind than 'just another Mom.'
Motherhood! What a glorious career! Especially when there's a title on the door.

Does this make grandmothers 'Senior Research associates in the field of Child Development and Human Relations?'
And great grandmothers 'Executive Senior Research Associates?'
I think so!!!
I also think it makes Aunts 'Associate Research Assistants.'

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I'm so glad I'm a mom!
Why are you glad you are a mom (or a dad if you are a dad) or if you don't have children, why are you glad FOR your mom?

WA State PTA Convention

I went to the Washington State PTA Convention this past weekend by the SeaTac airport on the other side of the state, where they have no idea our side of the state exists (they know there is another side to our state, but many people I talked with had only been to Tri-Cities once and kept asking if we were close to Spokane-for those of you who don't live in our state, we are about three hours, depending on traffic, from both Seattle and Spokane.)
Anyway, I drove up with our PTA Vice President this year, President the next, Darci. We left just after 6pm and got there at 9:50pm, longer than the three hours I just said I know-there was construction. Because our PTA president for our school is also involved in a middle school PTA, and the district and region PTA and was up for election for State Leadership Director, she left Wednesday morning and checked into the room the three of us shared. I requested a roll-a-way bed so we didn't have to share. It was very comfy.
We chatted for a little while and tried to help our over-achiever roommate prepare to teach a bunch of classes during the convention and help her relax a little too. I think we were good for her. We gave her a needed break from the living and breathing PTA (not that everyone has to do that all the time!)
This is some of our Region 12 group. Connie is the next Region 12 Director, Lynn is the current Region 12 Director, Kerrilynn does everything, I'm our local unit secretary, Darci is the Vice President and going to be President, and the last lady is Paula and she's from Hanford High and is their PTA Secretary.
More pictures are on Flickr here.
Friday morning I went down to get my registration packet before 8am and then went to the "first timer" information meeting to know how it all works and where things are or how to find out about them. Then I met up with my roommates and we all went to separate classes. I really enjoyed all the classes I went to and learned and got a lot of ideas that hopefully we can implement in our own PTA. I also enjoyed finding typos in the programs that they would give us. I found misspellings, things that should have been bold and weren't, and a few other things. I'm not going to bore you all with the details. I'll just keep that to myself. =)
Darci and I.There were close to 800 people from our state there at the conference, 10 from our region, which covers Tri-Cities, Walla Walla, and a few more places close by. Really low attendance from our side of the state. I met our whole group and many of the few who attended from Yakima too. I think we kind of team up with them so we don't feel so small.
Each day we had three classes which were between one and one and a half hours long. Friday and Saturday we had two General Sessions in a giant room that everyone could attend to vote on important things that the State PTA will do or to change the bylaws or to vote people into office. There were vendors from companies who wanted us to fundraise with them who would give us free stuff and information to look at. There were prizes that I didn't win and raffle baskets that are raffled off to help fund the scholarships for HS students that I didn't win. At the General Sessions there were speakers who were funny and interesting and thought-provoking. We heard from the National PTA President, Washington State Teacher of the Year, and the CEO of REI (they have a summer hiking/biking program), which started in Seattle, as well as the following speaker.
I'll share a few notes I took from the funniest speaker. Her name is Debbie Wooten and she was really, really funny! She was born in the hood in Chicago with spina bifida and then contracted polio as an infant, and the doctors told her mom that she would never walk or have children. Her mom didn't tell her daughter that and she defeated the odds and did both of those things. She said her mom told her after her third kid that she wasn't supposed to be able to have kids, and then she had two more. She said that as a kid, she always wanted to be like her "big, fat momma" and she would pray and pray for it and then when she got too fat as an adult, it took a lot longer to pray the weight off. One thing she told herself when raising her kids was, "If you can't hit, you gotta outwit!" Another kid one was, "If you can't beat 'em, feed them." She said that grandma's now-a-days have to be strong...just to haul those carseats around. She compared them to shoving a recliner into the car. I videoed a rap she made up for her kids to get them to listen to her.

The theme of the convention was superheroes, so the Saturday night dress up banquet came along (you could dress up as a super hero or just in nice clothes), and the National and State PTA Presidents came out dressed as Batman and Mr. Incredible. Oh, our State PTA President is the first male president in our state too, so I think they were being extra funny. Anytime someone called him "Madame President" instead of "Mr. President", he charged them five dollars that went into his bucket of money that would be donated and if a cell phone went off, they had to put a dollar in too. Great idea!
Our schedule wasn't over until at least 9pm each night (Friday and Saturday), so we were tired (not me as much since I don't sleep that early anyway), but it was really fun too.
Sunday was just three classes and then the State Reflections Program recognizing all the kids from our state who got to that level and the winners whose entry would go on to the National Competition. Then we went to eat and drove home. We got home about 9pm.
I love PTA! You had better be helping PTA where you are! If you don't have time, at least join so you know what's going on in your school.