Feb 2013

February!

I'm not sure why I must document every gory detail of our lives (especially the gory part)...

But I do. So. Here's gory story #1 (or maybe more like just gross in this situation)

Kalvin got these nasty white stone near his tonsils, called Tonsilloliths (and I used to get them when I was a kid and a rare occasion I may still get them now). They made his breath stink so bad! Like you could smell it when he walked by. I had Kalvin brushing his teeth often, but could not get his breath to smell any better. Once we got them out (after working several days and many attempts at getting Kalvin to cooperate), his breath smelled so much better! Duane dug the stones out with a plastic loop that is used to clean earwax out of ears. Kalvin was a trooper through it all though every time Duane went in Kalvin would gag, making it very difficult to work (plus Duane had to put up with me and the camera right in the action, bumping into him occasionally).

Here, you can see the stone near the middle, in the back (though they were on both sides).

 The same picture before I cropped it in:

 Kalvin tried his best to cooperate, but it was very difficult...

 Here, you can see the loop.

 Duane got part of one out! You can see it in the back...

Kalvin got tuckered out after a while so we had to stop that night, but the next night we tried again. Kalvin would not keep his eyes closed though! So we helped him. lol

Gross thing #2:

For about a week Kalvin would wake up every morning and sneeze out yellow 11's! 

Totally gross, but he thought it was absolutely hilarious and would walk around the house till I'd chase him into the bathroom to wash his face!

Anyway... moving on to funner things.

We went to our friends house for the Super Bowl. I've felt guilty ever since for watching it on Sunday, but I guess I had rationalized going since we are basically trying to help save their marriage so we try to get over there often to help them find some happiness. The kids always have a blast together!

Working on the shower that never ends! UGH!!!

It was hard showing our house for sale with the shower only partially finished...

As of current, no offers yet, but we are praying for patience and than is helping. Duane worked a little on the shower most nights and eventually got it in working order by the end of February (the steam part of the shower took a couple more weeks to get together).

Another undertaking in February was when I basically repainted the whole house! It was intense and something I don't look forward to ever having to do again! I painted all the baseboards that look fabulous now and the radiator boxes as well that look infinitely better as well! Also, all the walls were painted to the same color as well.

One day after a long day of painting, I was running late to get Kalvin from school and woke up Tristen and William from their naps and plopped them in the car (I was luckily able to get my clothes changed at least from the paint clothes I had on). After getting Kalvin we headed for McDonalds since I promised him the night before if we got all the white stones out of his mouth, I'd take him for ice cream. Once we got there I decided to go inside (which I don't usually do) to let the kids run around. That was a mistake... Below is the post I put on Facebook of our incident there.

A fellow McDonalds goer really struck a cord with me. Apparently, my children were not wearing enough layers of clothes for his liking and so he threatened to turn me into CPS. It was 25 degrees outside and my baby (who is not walking yet) was without socks (though fully bundled in warm sweaters), my toddler (3 y.o.) was not wearing a snow jacket (frankly, I've only been able to talk him into wearing very heavy jackets when there's a blizzard outside) and the fuzzy slippers he was wearing and the large fleece blanket he had bundled around him, were apparently not warm enough. I have always been much more lenient than most women with making my children wear jackets and sweaters that they would prefer not to wear.

This man repeatedly approached me and questioned me asking if I needed help with getting warm gear and then putting his hand on my arm and touching my babies legs, saying "this just isn't sitting well with me". He let me know that all he had to to was make a single call and he could have my place "checked out" with CPS.

At the time I was nearly laughing out loud thinking, 'Please, search my home, you'll see my children are well cared for', but as I had time to think about it, the laughter turned into frustration. Honestly, I feel that my children are at a higher risk of sickness and disease after playing on the McDonalds playground (we always come straight home to a bubble bath after playing there) and eating their food, than they are walking the 15 feet in 25 degree weather from the car to inside McDonalds!

Living in New York has made me so much more paranoid as a parent with people thinking they need to be responsible for my kids because apparently they think I'm not.

PLEASE, let me be!
(I posted this on Facebook in conjunction with the picture below and had a healthy amount of feedback and comments in my defense)

My cutie patootie! William is starting to talk! 

He can say several words: Hi, Thank you, apple, Wow (in a whisper voice), here e' go.

Just last night as I was putting the boys to bed, I ask who wanted to say the prayer. Quickly, Kalvin and Tristen said, "me!" and continued to repeat this over and over going back and forth when William interrupted, "Me!". It was a fun moment. (3-11-13)

Oh and he's loving kisses! 

But usually when he goes in for the kiss he will open his mouth wide at the last split second!

One night after putting the kids to bed, I walked into the kitchen to turn the lights off before going up to bed myself and found this brand new loaf of bread had been cut open by someone and only a few bites had been taken of a single piece of bread... Only Tristen...

This mask scared William every time Kalvin put it on so we had to warm him up to it, but eventually William even let us put it on him.

I am very lenient; perhaps too lenient. Kalvin is very physically tough. He's always been this way and he likes to push his limits and his abilities. One night when Duane was on call at the hospital, Kalvin came downstairs after playing up in the suite with Tristen to ask if he could jump down the stairs. This is what he had in mind... Crazy boys!

Some days I think I'll miss having the snow. As much work as it is in so many ways, the kids have so much fun in it.

Kalvin and Tristen got $$ from Grandma and Grandpa Ellsworth for Christmas. We finally got around to taking them to Toys R Us in February to spend the money. I was glad they each picked one expensive thing (instead of a bunch of throw away toys). Kalvin got moon shoes (who knew they would cost $40!?) and Tristen got the big switch n' go Dino ($50!). They were happy to have these new toys!

Tristen has worked hard to earn two of these Dino's by doing a chore at a time (each chore is $.25) and the other one he got for Christmas from Santa and then of course the big one was from the money that he got from Grandma and Grandpa Ellsworth for Christmas. He is very protective of them and knows how to transform them from dino to car quicker and better than anyone else at home. I came in the toy room one day to see he had them all lined up and was imagining some kind of scenario.

His best smile (on demand, that is)!

Tristen's two favorite things: 1. Eating popcorn from his theater style popcorn maker he got from Santa and 2. Watching movies on Mom's computer.

In Winter out here it's mostly miserable so if ever there is a break in the wind or the sun actually decides to shine for an afternoon, we jump on it to get the kids (and ourselves) outside. There is a golf course a mile from our house that closes for the winter (obviously) and kids from all over sled here though there are so many hills everywhere it never feels cramped. We had a great time together one afternoon that Duane happened to get home fairly early and I had the kids dressed for snow and was ready to go the second Duane pulled up (since the sun sets very early out here in the winter).

William is very close to his Daddy. Need I even wonder why?

Took a tumble Tristen? I think so!

We had a hard time getting into Tristen's head that he should walk up the grassy area and out of the way of the other kids sledding down, but he just doesn't seem to listen sometimes and nearly got plowed once by someone coming flying down the hill.

Mommy's turn for some fun with the kids!

Then Daddy's turn with William too!

Kalvin is so much like Duane! He's definitely inherited his smarts and fun, easy-to-please demeanor. I am so thankful for all this. One night he was playing with my rolling tape/glue dispenser and it broke inside. He took the time to work on it for several minutes and got it in working order again. He finished and let me know that it was good to go. I'm sure I'll use his natural engineering skills many times as he grows up.

Happy Valentines Day to Daddy! The boys made these heart cards for him and Duane brought home a box of chocolates for the boys as well.

Selling a house can be stressful! The anxiety was taking a toll on me so I decided to take a road trip with the kids for 5 days and visit my brother and Sister-in-law in Pennsylvania. We had so much fun out there! Karri fed me wonderful, healthy food (most of which she has her own recipes) and the boys had so much fun with their cousins! They live just outside Pittsburg and so we made the trip a couple times to the city for the Science Center and Museum. I was definitely impressed! They had just opened the space exhibit at the Science Center so Karri and I tried the gravity defying challenge. I was surprised at how hard it was to pull myself down!

Then we swapped kids and Karri took a turn.

At the top floor we played at the water spot for quite a while. It is completely enclosed so the kids don't run away.

Being at their home and driving around reminded me of visiting my cousin's who lived in Hershey, Pennsylvania when I was young. There are hills everywhere and the road wind all over! Crossing this bridge I could just imagine how beautiful it is in the summer and fall. You can't see it very well at all, but up ahead is a hill with homes and trees all over.

Larry and Karri are so good at having scriptures every night as their bedtime routine. They have the boys sit on the couch and they are able to enjoy scripture cookies while it's not their turn. It worked very well! Duane and I read scriptures with the kids at night during dinner, but have a harder time getting it in consistently as I'm usually too busy telling Duane all about my day and forget to think about having scriptures. The cousin's loved having a turn to repeat the scripture after Uncle Larry or Aunt Karri would read. Tristen took it especially seriously. We have since tried this in our home, but we still need to work on it...

They have a jet tub! Kalvin and Tristen instantly recognized this from Grandma and Grandpa's house in Chandler and wanted a bubble bath. We got a couple in before our trip was through.

William fell in under the bubbles... and is done now.

Besides relaxing, another thing I looked forward to was giving the boys haircuts. We were able to get this in as well.

One spot in Pittsburg is tram that takes you up a very steep hill to a look out spot for Pittsburg. The boys and I all loved it!

From this view, you can see three rivers that join in Pitts and Larry and Karri showed us all the bike paths they've been on with their kiddos. What a fun family!

They have THE COOLEST dinosaur exhibit at the museum in Pittsburg as well. There are several dinosaur bones on display here. They were amazing to see. 

Can you see how small the head is on this leaf eating dino (it's on the upper right of the photo)?

Here's the T-rex. So big!

Several times as we walked around and I held William I heard him whispering, "Wow!" as he marveled at the large dinosaurs.

At the end of the dino exhibit, they have a dig sight for the kids. They are instructed at how to dig out the "bones" then they are given a chisel, goggles, and a paint brush to excavate their own dinosaur bones. The boys thought this was awesome and worked hard for about 15 minutes!

On the last night we were there, Uncle Larry got out the fireworks. Kalvin and Tristen were thrilled with the sparklers!

And then Uncle Larry got out the smoke bombs and colorful spinners. This photo was kind of cool since Larry was burned into the picture as if he sat and watched the firework (which would be totally dangerous) as it spun.

Uncle Larry light painting with sparklers! Way cooler than just a flashlight!

Aunt Karri doing some fun creation as well.

Groupshot!

That night, after the kids were down, we played a new game, Quirkle! I whooped Larry and Karri!

William and Adam had late naps so they stayed up with us, eating strawberries.

After Quirkle, we played a good game of Tie One On. Karri is pretty amazing at this game!

Driving home!

I was so excited to get home to see the shower Duane had finished! 

The steam system wasn't quite put in yet.

It's so echoy in the shower when the door is shut since it's completely sealed off because of the steam system. Kalvin was the first to try it out and he sang the whole time he was in the shower. The next morning before school, Kalvin asked to take a shower again. I said he could so he ran up. When I  came up to check on him, I looked inside to see he had both shower heads spraying on him as he sang happily. I just had to laugh.

Kalvin talked to Grandpa Ellsworth on the phone one day and told him he was so excited to go to the office when we moved back to AZ so he could have some candy from their candy drawer. A few days later, Kalvin got a package in the mail from Grandpa Ellsworth it was a box full of candy. Kalvin was in heaven (and did a good job sharing his sweets with the rest of us)!

I would have to say that if there were one thing the boys look forward to every day more than anything else it would easily be playing wrestle upstairs before bedtime. They will run up and back the length of the room (about 35 feet) while Duane (and sometimes I'm up there too) try to trip them or pick them up and throw them on the love sack.

A laugh thinking about one night we were up there. Kalvin was taking off his clothes (This is very common. I usually find at least one set of clothes up there very day) and said, "I saw someone doing this" (as he took off his clothes). Duane and I look at each other in a kind of panicky way and I pried to know what he is talking about. I calmed down after he told me he saw someone running down the street (the jogging path) in very short shorts.

Kalvin loves jumping over people, it drives me crazy when he jumps over me though and he gets busted when he does! Tristen doesn't seem to mind as much.

Lots of snow in February (though I expected nothing less as it is supposed to be the coldest month of the year). After the snow would first come down, we'd get out and play in it in the morning before taking Kalvin to school because they typically have a 2 hour delay for school to start on days when it snowed the night before.

We were having a great time out there and I was taking lots of pictures, but not paying super close attention to what the boys were doing and what bad outcomes could follow until I saw a snowball fly right in front of me and hit William square in the face! He was not a happy camper! 

(I may have told Kalvin to wait to clean the snow off Williams face so I could snap a picture first.)

After the snow-in-the-face incident, William sat on the front step very nicely most of the time till we went back inside.

Him sitting up there didn't stop me from taking pictures of him though (Look at those cold lips!).

Kalvin spent his time building a snowman!

Seeing Kalvin's snowman made Tristen want to do the same. His just came out looking a little less like a snow man and more like a ball of snow with poka dots. It was still fun for him to put together though!

Snow plows! Still not sure why they had to drive up the street 3 times scraping though... it was cleared after the first pass and it was supposed to get up to the mid 40's this day so the snow melted very quickly.

This little guy loves to be mischievous! When he's done eating he'll stand in his high chair and scream and yell till someone gets him out. If someone gives him attention, he'll make this cute faces.

I watched my friends three kids and Tristen could tell he was bigger than the other baby and did his best to let this other baby know that it was so. He liked to play with the baby, but would also push him and when I'd pick up the baby, William would of course get instantly jealous. Too funny!