Looking up into the rain

No pictures were taken for this post. Not that they'd have been any good.

Why, why, why do I ever take my kids places.

In my head, I know why. I love to see them experience new things. And when they're happy, it's really really fun. And when they're not, it's horrid.

Last night my brother had everyone over for dinner. I was excited, because they've lived in their house for nearly a year and I hadn't seen it yet. Something about being a little busy in January when they were moving, or something. Their house is 111 years old (or is it 110?) this year. Happy birthday, cool old house.

So. Dinner, and we did the gift exchange early, since Brady and Meghan will be in Oklahoma for Christmas. So, twenty-plus people in a little old house, dinner, and presents. We had a pretty good time, except for the two and a half year old who thinks he's a dictator. "I want a chocolate cookie!" And when you want a chocolate cookie, nothing else will do.

After dinner and presents, we decided to go see the lights at Temple Square. We've been meaning to, and hey, we're in Salt Lake already. Fun, right?

No. Nathan decided he would enjoy none of it, except riding the escalator in the visitor's center and trying to run away. We tried to distract him into enjoying the lights, but no. "No, there are not a lot of lights," he answered crossly. This contradictory phase of his cannot end fast enough.

We'd been there less than ten minutes when we decided to bail. And sweet Clara, who hadn't made a peep the entire time, arched away from me and lay her head back out into the air, her face poking out from under the umbrella, and watched the night sky as raindrops fell on her face. At least one of us was a stoic last night.

And Nathan? If I had my way, which I just might, he may not leave the house again until Christmas. Maybe that way he'll be rested enough to behave himself.

Our Cookie House

I woke up yesterday with a strange desire to make a gingerbread house. I've not made a gingerbread house, a real one, since I was little. For a while my family would get together and make houses out of graham crackers, but it was before I had kids, and I didn't get into it.

Nathan really enjoyed it. This morning he told me, "Look. I put candy on the cookie house."

Clara was bummed she didn't get to help.

I was happy that I cheated and put my house together with toothpicks. And, since the royal icing was a sticky mess, that I had pre-emptively cheated and bought a can of frosting with different decorative tips. It's still kind of a Charlie Brown gingerbread house, but it could have been much worse.

Growing up

 What's for breakfast? Pieces of blackberry. mmm... I'm not sure I thought this one through. But the stains came out of the bib like magic.

 This morning, while we were (not) exercising, I mentioned that I've been thinking of trimming Clara's funny side hair. They're like gigantic sideburns, or little Jewish boy curls. But I haven't been able to bring myself to do it. So, since we were already busy not exercising, my friend got out a comb, a spray bottle, and two elastics. Doesn't she look grown up with big-girl pigtails?

There's no way I can cut it now.

Mostly falling asleep in weird places.

 This is the blanket box that resides under his bed. I'm sure his thinking was, "Mom told me to take a nap in my bed. I'll show her!" Too bad his plan was foiled by actually falling asleep.

 He recently learned how to do thumbs up. So now we have random thumbs-upping throughout the day. I guess we're lucky he hasn't learned thumbs down yet.

And this was Sunday, when he woke up with a fever, and fell asleep over his PBJ.

Re-enacting our favorite parts of Christmas Story

I think this was Thanksgiving weekend. We went to see the Christmas lights at the Roy city offices. Because I was feeling Christmasy, but unambitious. And it was frigid. We thought Nathan would love seeing the lights, and the reindeer, and sitting in Santa's sleigh. And he did. But after a few minutes he said, "I want to find the car." And by that time Clara was moaning in misery. I guess it was a good test run. If we go out to see more lights, more bundling will be in order. If that's even possible.

 "I can't put my arms down!"


The only way this could be better is if this pink snowsuit had bunny ears attached to it.

Wherein I dwell on the positive

Well, I've done my share of whining already today, over on my "other" blog. Just in case you were wondering.

So here's the good stuff.

Today Nathan told me "I want to singing in my ears." We were listening to Christmas music.

 And my baby is lounging on my lap, delightfully eating her feet, eternally hopeful she'll get her hands on that delicious keyboard. She just glimpsed a picture of herself and got very excited.

And we had an excellent Relief Society Christmas party last night. Y'all who missed it, missed out.