First Saturday in Seattle

The kids woke up way too early the next morning, but I was so excited to see Natalie and meet her baby and get a tour of her house, I didn't even care.  We spent the morning doing all of those things and it was so fun!

Getting my baby fix with little Claire!

Uncle Craig!

Early morning cousin breakfast

Sometime before noon, we headed out to Safeco Field to see the Mariner's play!  I was excited to take my kids to a ball game-- we haven't been in forever-- and also to meet up with the rest of my family and ALSO to finally get to meet Adam!  So this felt like kind of a big deal.  Naturally, as soon as we left, Camille's lack of sleep caught up with her and she completely freaked out:

Someone went to bed at three in the morning...!

Fortunately, within a few minutes she was zonked:

Me, my Mom, and Rachael (with baby Harrison!!!) at the game

Most of us!

I can't remember if this was Leah's or Natalie's idea, but I love that we did this!  There were 27 of us at the game, so we figured we counted as a "large group" finally!

I spent a lot of the game with two kids on my lap!  There's Tracy, Kendra, & Adam behind me!

Cutey Claire waking up

That's a lot of us, but we missed Brian and Cameron somehow...

I was SO excited to get to see Ichiro wearing a Mariner's uniform again!!!!!  (He got a couple hits and made some AMAZING catches, too!)

Craig took all the kids to meet the Mariner Moose

We had to get our car to the ferry and had a hard time making the left turn we needed to go the right direction. So we missed the first boat and had to wait for the next one.  I'd sent my big kids with my parents so they could get to my parents' house right away, so here they are on the ferry with everyone else:

On the ferry heading to Bainbridge

It turned out that Adam was on the same ferry we were on (he'd raced back to his apartment to close up windows before heading to my parents' house), so we got him all to ourselves while we waited in line and then on the boat!  So that was a great chance to visit with him while I wasn't also simultaneously trying to yell encouragement to Ichiro.  As you can see, my kids were tidily won over by him!

My kids love their Uncle Adam

Watching the water glide by

Love those blue eyes

It was a great day, but we ended it even more exhausted than when we'd begun!

Two Flights to Seattle

It's been a month since my last blog post???  How did THAT happen???

Okay, actually, I know how that happened.  Things got busy.  Like, REALLY busy.  I was already pretty overwhelmed trying to get us all ready for our trip to Seattle-- trying to figure out clothes for everyone for a wedding AND for a family photo shoot AND how to get it all in suitcases AND what to pack to keep the kids happy on the plane AND figuring out where everyone was going to sleep once we got there took up all of my mental energy.  And then the week of our trip, a couple of my friends from Manassas decided to come visit me (their spring break was the week before mine), which was awesome, but made things very busy.  AND THEN, the day before we were leaving, Colton woke me up at 4am complaining that his ear hurt, so I had to squeeze in a doctor's appointment and make sure we got antibiotics that he would't be allergic to and that didn't need to be refrigerated for our day of travel...  And then we got home at 2am last Monday and I could barely get through the week I was so exhausted and trying to get the kids (and myself) adjusted back to east coast time...  So, yeah, I've been really busy and REALLY tired.

But I'm happy to report that the actual trip was wonderful and Tracy's wedding was fabulous (no weird drama that you need to worry about), and I'll tell you all the happy details in lots of blog posts to come!  Maybe if I can really get my act together, I'll go back and report on my other kids' birthdays, too! 

For now, this is what we looked like waiting for our plane at the Richmond airport:

Notice the pile of coats and backpacks?  I wasn't planning on bringing coats because they take up so much space, but my mom and sisters convinced me that Seattle was still chilly enough that we would need them.  So glad I listened, even if lugging all that around was a huge pain!

Since Colton isn't in the other picture, here he is to prove we didn't forget him!

The kids were super well behaved for the trip, but our first flight ended up being delayed about an hour, which was a big problem because we only had an hour layover in Dallas.  So we spent our entire first flight freaking out about missing our second flight.  We learned that the Richmond Airport is small and easy to navigate, but that there is something very wrong with the runway situation there, since it caused problems going and coming.  On the way out, we got delayed because the plane was too heavy for which way the wind was blowing.  Normally they'd just use the other runway, but something was blocking it.  After a bit the wind shifted and we took off, but I found the whole thing disconcerting, to say the least.  (And on our return trip, the captain decided to switch planes because the brakes on the plane they originally loaded us into weren't good enough for such a short runway.  Does anyone else find this worrisome???)  We spent the whole flight watching the clock and wondering what we would do if we missed our flight.  As soon as we landed, I told Craig to run and beg them to wait for us, but it's nearly impossible to run anywhere in an airport, and we just ended up on the same train anyway.  But they HAD held the plane for us, so that was a HUGE relief.  (I guess that's the perk to traveling with a group of seven?)  But then Colton tripped and fell and skinned his nose as we were making our way onto the plane, so we all filed onto this crowded plane with one screaming child and I'm sure everyone was just delighted to see us.

And THEN, it turned out that all the people had taken our seats, since they figured we weren't coming by then, so we had to shuffle everyone out of our seats and off to whatever middle seats they thought they'd escaped from.  And in the midst of that, one of the passengers we'd displaced looks at me and says, "Don't I know you...?"  It took me a minute (I was busy wrangling kids and trying to figure out who was sitting where!) and suddenly I realized I was staring at my old bishop's youngest son, who I went to high school with so many years ago!

Small world.  He ended up with Ryder sitting behind him and probably kicking his seat the whole time, poor guy!

Anyway, we arrived in Seattle with no more drama.  Thank goodness for airplanes with individual screens in the seats, my kids didn't make a peep that whole flight.  Then we got our luggage (it all made the flight, too!  Happy day!!!) and our rental car and drove to my sister Natalie's new home in Auburn.  It was close to midnight when we finally got there (so, 3am, east coast time) and she had sleeping bags and beds all set up for everyone and my kids were barely even aware they were being steered out of the car, they were so out of it.

Cross country travel with kids is NOT for the faint of heart.

But we made it!

Camille is Three

Camille turned three in February, so that was very exciting and a little weird to think that my "baby" is getting so big so fast and isn't really a baby at all any more.  During the week of her birthday she suddenly started acting like a complete brat, so it's nice to know that she's right on schedule for her age!  She's mostly super fun, but she's got quite the chip on her shoulder at times....  A few examples:

-The other day, she was laying on her stomach in the hallway, playing with a dollhouse.  When I walked by her, she smiled sweetly and said, "Hi, Mommy!" and then she immediately scowled and followed up with, "Now go away!"  Nice, kid.

-Early in the morning, she was snuggled up against me, tracing the stripes on my bathrobe.  I asked her what she was doing and her answer was, "I'm just... doing what I'm doing."

-Yesterday, she cried for 10 minutes because I hadn't had time to grab her a snack (we were just dropping Colton off at speech therapy and returning home, so she just needed to wait a few minutes-- I wasn't being cruel here).  At the end of her crying she yelled, "You're just ruining my entire life!"  Can't wait to see what she's like as a teenager!

Can you tell she got herself dressed?

So excited for her "new" carseat

She's very tricky-- she learned this in gymnastics class

I LOVE it when kids sit on their feet like this-- it's so cute!

This picture feels a little dirty, but aren't these socks from my sister Leah cute???

Here she is laughing as Colton puts his feet on her...?

That's some good duck face

She and Ryder look like siblings here

Here she is (on her birthday) looking impressed by her superhero brother

Kendra fastened a balloon onto her hat, and then Camille proceeded to wear it.  Reminds me of Blossom!

Here she is pouting on the stairs

Anyway, for her birthday, I invited a few friends over to play and have desserts (mini cupcakes for the kids, leftover book club treats for the grown-ups).  And then in the evening we had Costco pizza and family movie night, which is always a delight.  So I think it was a good day.  I'm always torn with how to celebrate my kids' birthdays-- how to make it special without just throwing away money for no good reason.  A few days later we celebrated her birthday and Kendra's with Grandma and Grandpa, but I think that will be another post (assuming I remember!).

Camille is such a kick-- she cracks me up all the time.  And even though I like to complain about how bossy she is, I secretly love that about her.  I like girls who refuse to let their big brothers (or even their mommy) push them around.  This girl will go places in life, just you wait!

I love my Cami-P!

Richmond Science Museum

With some of the Christmas money we received, we decided to get a membership to the Richmond Museum of Science.  A couple of our kids had been there for field trips and liked it, and we figured this would be a good Saturday activity to get us through the winter months.  We've been twice so far and it's been a lot of fun-- it's nice to spend half the day there, and know we can come back and keep exploring.  This last time, just as we were about to leave, I discovered a whole new wing, so there's still more to look forward to!

Playing air hockey against a machine

Trying to make herself as small as possible.  Doesn't this look like she's just been tortured or something?

Yeah, this looks like a movie poster for a psychological thriller.  From the 80s.  Perhaps involving a computer...

I told her to smile, but she couldn't be bothered to look up!

Snuggly Colton

Craig was proud of the American flag he fashioned out of the glo-lights

Four kids all playing nicely together!

I like that you can see Bentley helping Camille here-- good big brother!

My "big" kids chilling

We went back again this last Saturday, bringing Craig's parents with us this time.  And we had a blast again!  So this has already been a good investment and we look forward to many more trips this year!

Giant outdoor chess set!

I love how Ryder is carrying this pawn that's half his size!

Bentley insisted we see Rat Basketball and it was actually really fun-- who knew rats could be so entertaining???

You can see us sitting up front

Everyone except Colton was excited to pet the rat afterwards

Even Camille!  I think she stood in line twice to do it!

And now Bentley wants a pet rat.  Of course.

I think this was where you could experience hurricane force winds?  I think Camille and I were having a snack at this point...

After the museum, Craig's parents treated us to dinner at Chuy's.  It was a bit of a wait (which is why I'm wrestling Ryder here) but the food was EXCELLENT.

Here's another one where I don't look scary

The kids discover Push-Ups.  And yes, Bentley has mastered the art of looking weird for a picture, while making it look as if he doesn't know his picture is being taken.  Trust me, that face was on purpose.  My wacky son...

One of the weird things about all this is that... (drumroll, please)... WE DON'T NEED A STROLLER.  I haven't done day activities like this without a stroller in 11 years!  Such progress!  Yay for family fun!

Church Callings

Life continues to be busy.

A few weeks ago, they released me from working with the young women and put me in the Relief Society presidency.  I'm actually pretty excited for the change-- I loved working with the girls and I adore the YWs president, but she was super disorganized and it was starting to make me crazy.  You know that phrase, "Nature abhors a vacuum"?  Well, with the vacuum of leadership and organization, I was slowly turning into the type-A person trying to make sure stuff actually happened.  I felt like I was getting sucked into that role against my better nature.  It was weird.

The R.S. president is super organized, so I think working with her will be a good change.  Also, she's very social and I've been lonely in this ward-- everyone lives so far that people hardly ever bother to get together.  So I suspect that spending time with other grown-ups will also be good for me.  But it's going to be a lot of work, too-- I spent over an hour on Sunday evening calling sisters to conduct visiting teaching interviews.  It was exhausting.  But good-- good to hear what they're trying to do, what they're concerned about, good to get ideas of what changes can be made to improve things.

Here's to working with grown-ups again!

Sew Done

You know that I can't sew, right?

Not only do I not know ANYTHING about sewing, I actually come from a long line of non-sewing people.  My Grandma Bentley was so bad at sewing that back when girls had to take home-ec classes (or whatever they called it then), they finally just had her sit in the back with scissors to cut out other people's bad stitches.  She was THAT hopeless!  My Mom, who is very capable in many ways, used to hire people to sew stuff for her whenever she needed costumes for my sisters' hula classes or whatnot. 

So I've always known that I come by my inability to sew very naturally.

But I've still sort of wondered if I actually tried to learn, just maybe I might be capable of sewing.  I mean, my Grandma Hansen loved to crochet, so maybe-- like with every superhero story--there was some hidden power lying dormant in me, just waiting to be tapped...  if someone were to teach me... very patiently..?

But I think it's time I gave up on that notion.  I've tried sewing things for church a couple times, and both times I mysteriously ended up with these race car sewing machines that were impossible to control.  (REALLY!  Both times!!!  Other women came to help me and both times they were like, "Yikes, this machine is really difficult!"  So I'm not just making excuses for myself.  It wouldn't even occur to me to make something like that up!)  The second time, we were making infinity scarves and while I actually like mine and occasionally wear it, I always try very to hide the stitching because it loops all over and back on itself in a sort of amazingly bad way.

I did show it to one friend because I knew she'd find it funny (she wrote a book on quilting, so yeah, she knows how to sew).  She tried to be nice and say it wasn't too bad and then she got to the actually really bad part and she began howling with laughter.  I was happy to laugh along with her, so don't feel bad for me here.  I'm not aiming for pity, I'm just trying to give you an honest picture of literally how incapable I am of this stuff.

But I still occasionally think I must be able to figure it out.  I mean-- it all makes sense in my head, so how hard can it be?  But in the last couple weeks I've tried to hand-stitch a couple things back together (the belt loop on my bathrobe and the loop on the back of Ryder's tie) and it really was kind of amazing how much I could mess up these simple tasks!  At one point I accidentally poked the needle all the way through the tie and then back in an inch away!  How did I do that without even realizing it???  I have no idea.  I suspect that sitting on my bed and chatting on the phone while trying to do a task which I am wildly incapable of doing is a bad idea.  But still!!!!!

A couple snips with the scissors and it was fine.  My Grandma would be so proud.

Rescue Bunny

I woke up suddenly at 2am and for once it wasn't because of Colton.  As I laid there wondering what had startled me awake, I heard what must have been a second thump.  And then half a minute later, another one.

Our bunny was being noisy.

We'd given her a new box to chew on, and in the process of trying to tear it to shreds, she was banging it against the floor.  This was an easy fix, so once I'd determined that she wasn't likely to stop (and, therefore, was going to continue keeping me awake), I wandered down in the dark to take the box out of her cage.  She was eager for some attention, so I patted her head and stroked her ears a bit.  I realized that the last time she was this noisy, she was out of water, so I flipped on a light to check and sure enough, our poor bunny had no water.  I grabbed a cup full to dump in the bowl, and then another.  She surprised me by not seeming too interested in the water (usually she'll try to nose the cup as the water is flowing-- it makes me laugh).

As I turned back to the kitchen, I noticed a faint glow on the couch.  I knew Bentley had left his laptop there, so I was expecting to see a small, sharp light.  I looked closer and discovered that he'd somehow wrapped the laptop up in a blanket and left it plugged in.  I pulled it out of the blanket and it was burning hot, with the fans whirring unable in vain to cool it down.

I quickly moved it to a flat surface and then meandered back to bed wondering if my bunny hadn't just saved our house from being burned down.

Good bunny, Oreo.  That was a good reason to wake me up in the middle of the night.

Getting Back Into the Swing of Things

I'm finally back to exercising again.  Last spring (in preparation for my high school reunion) I finally got where I would do that 7-minute workout, but I'd do it like it was circuit training, so I'd do it three times (making it a 21-minute workout I guess?), and then try to do that three times a week.  I felt like that was a pretty good routine and I was happy with it all until school got out and all my kids were home all the time.

Then it was impossible.

It's kind of amazing watching what happens if I tell the kids to not bug me for 21 minutes.  They're starving.  They're fighting.  They're crawling over and under me (DO NOT CRAWL UNDER ME WHEN I'M TRYING TO DO WALL SITS!!!!).  They need me to open this.  They need me to go here or there with them.  Someone hurt their feelings.  They need a snack.  They want me to invite a friend over.  They want to go outside.  They need another snack.  They managed to touch my phone and pause it without me knowing so that I'm stuck doing what should be a 30 second circuit for 2-and-a-half minutes until I realize what's going on.  Someone punched them.  PLEASE DON'T SIT ON MOMMY WHILE SHE'S TRYING TO DO PUSH-UPS.  They managed to make a chair fall over on top of them and now they're screaming in agony....  And trust me, ALL OF THIS has happened during those 21 minutes.

And I try to be fairly even tempered, but when all this happens while I'm trying to do push ups, suddenly I'm just screaming at everyone.  BECAUSE THERE'S ONLY SO MUCH I CAN TAKE, OKAY???

Anyway, for everyone's sanity, I quit exercising during the summer.  And I had every intention of starting up again as soon as they were back in getting back in school, but then that didn't happen until...  January.  Oops?  (I guess I should thank Tracy for getting married and giving me a reason to finally set goals for myself and all that stuff.)


But now that I've built back up to being able to do it again, here are the things I like about exercising:

-I like that it warms me up.  In the winter time when I feel like I'm cold all the time, this is a really good thing.  I like not being freezing for a little bit of the day.

-I like that my body does pretty well with it.  I tend to improve very quickly and noticeably, and that makes me happy.  I'm very thankful for a healthy body that can do stuff like this.  In my book club last night one of my friends was talking about how society teaches women to hate their bodies and I know she's right, but I've never felt quite that bad about my body.  Sure-- I'm well aware when I should be trying to lose weight.  I'm not immune to this stuff.  But I've also usually been pretty happy with my body, flawed or not, and the many things it can do if I just try.  Exercise is a good reminder of that fact.

-It's a good excuse to play some perky music really loud for a bit.  I like loud music.

-I enjoy the sense of accomplishment I feel after exercising.  Even if I didn't do anything else all day, I at least did one thing that pretty much everyone agrees is a good thing to do.

But, I've learned a few important things, too...

-I have to exercise in the morning, before I shower.  Once I've showered, exercising is not gonna happen.  (I can't even tell you how many times I've thought, I'll just do it tonight!  Nope.  Never.  Don't even think it.)

-I do actually like to challenge myself by making things a tiny bit harder, like for example, I usually add weights to some of the exercises (like lunges or squats).  But I have to be really careful because it also makes things exponentially more challenging with kids around.  They're ability to walk into my swinging weight is matched only by how often they'll steal and then fight over my weights (or try to drop them on top of my phone) or other things that can have disastrous results.  Exercising with even just two kids around is NOT for the feint of heart.

-All this to say, I've started daydreaming about going running once they're all in school in a couple years.  That's pretty weird, coming from me, but I guess it's good to have some hobbies planned for when that day arrives...  right?