blessing day

On Sunday, we blessed Hudson at church. It was a beautiful, bright, sunny day and Tom gave him a beautiful blessing. We've always been a little nervous about blessing our children as the first experience was rather traumatic. Although she was normally a very even-tempered baby, Elleke screamed throughout her entire blessing making it difficult to hear a word Tom said. So with Avarie, we decided to bless her at home so that we could control the environment and choose the ideal moment for her to be in her best spirits. Everything went smoothly with her so we decided to take a chance and go back to church for Hudson. Despite a few tense seconds of him fussing when they all first got up there, he quickly settled down and was an angel. It was a special day and we were happy to be surrounded by family and friends.

After church, we had a lunch at our house of lasagna, salad, rolls (thanks again, Nat) and fruit. For dessert, I made some baby blue and white popcorn and baby blue frosted cupcakes with blue sprinkles. Ava was so excited that I made cupcakes--they are a huge favorite at our house and she has been begging me to make them for a couple of weeks. Before anyone could eat any and enduring quite a bit of heckling, I made sure to take some pictures of them looking all pretty on the pedestal.

So after everyone left, I went up to rest while Hudson was napping. When I came back down to clean up the kitchen, I found the remaining seven cupcakes with the frosting licked and bitten off. Hmmmm, wonder who did that...I got out my giggles before I called Ava over to give her a stern little lecture.

I couldn't be too harsh--if I had been left alone with them, I would have eaten them all too.

mystery solved

Sticking to her typical routine, this morning Ava wandered groggily into our room at around 7:30, squinted and rubbed her eyes, climbed into our bed and politely requested some chocolate milk and Max & Ruby. So Tom cued up the TiVO and we began suffering through one of the episodes we've all watched about 563 times (did I mention that this is Ava's all-time favorite and most-requested TV program?). I was half listening to the one entitled "Max's Birthday" when my ears immediately perked up at the mention of an Aunt Claire and Uncle Nate that Max needed to write a thank you note to for the birthday gift they sent him. Sound familiar? Yes, this is the mysterious Aunt Carol and Uncle Nate that Ava introduced us to a few weeks ago. We have now discovered their origins and are relieved that they weren't a complete fabrication after all.

And one more thing, having your two-year-old drop a half gallon of milk all over your kitchen floor really sucks.

ahhh, fall...

I have a confession--I love fall. This may come as a shock to those of you who know me (especially my husband who is a die-hard fallophile) because I have stood by summer my entire life as the best season of the year. In truth, as I'm getting older and life is about more than working on my tan by the pool, I'm finding myself appreciating the changes and natural wonders each new season brings. I'm lucky enough to live in a place where I can experience four distinct and beautiful seasons every year and as the weather is cooling down, I'm getting excited about celebrating autumn holidays, breaking out my sweaters and jeans and gathering around the fireplace.

I've also been excited about something else fall brings--soccer! I played tons of soccer in my youth and loved it. And I'm loving watching Elleke develop into a talented, agressive little player whose specialty is stealing the ball from other girls (sometimes on her own team) at all costs. She did a week-long soccer camp this summer where she improved her skills and increased her knowledge of the basics of the game. And she moved up a notch this year which means she's playing on a bigger field with five players at a time and with actual, uniformed referees. Big changes from last year. Tom is co-coaching her team (officially known as "The Cheetah Girls") and the girls are all having a blast.

Except for the first game of the year. Two Saturdays ago our cute little Cheetahs played against a team that looked like they played on the high school varsity football team in their spare time. These girls were big, fast and they ran all over us. It was hard to take for the girls and even harder for the parents. It was a total shutout. This was clearly not a game being played for fun.

During the carnage on the field, one of Ella's teammates, Tiana, who was sitting out for the quarter, came over to her mom with a sad, defeated look on her face and said, "Mom, I heard the girls on the other team talking and they said they didn't like our uniforms. That the colors were ugly." I couldn't help but laugh. The Cheetahs were getting destroyed out there. The other team could have said they were beating the tar out of our girls or that they didn't know how to play very well and they would have just shrugged their shoulders and walked away. But insulting their fashion? That was a dagger to the heart. Totally inexcusable and unforgiveable. It was a bad day all around. But last Saturday was much better (Cheetahs won 4-1, not that anyone was keeping score or anything...) and I don't care what those Dragons (or whatever they were) say, our girls are the most stylish ones on the field.

Oh, and one more thing I love about fall--BYU football! BYU-59 UCLA-0. Ranked #11. Need I say more? Lots of Cougar Fight Song singing around our house.

P.S. Did you see the new header. It's my first attempt and I have a feeling it's going to get better so stay tuned...

routines

As much as I love summer, I'm starting to love the routine of starting school again almost as much. Ella started second grade a couple of weeks ago (and looked pretty cute in her new clothes on the first day as you can see here) and comes home excited about something everyday--it might be her teacher, a project she's working on or the books she's gotten from the library. I, like most parents, am always a little nervous at the beginning of the school year, hoping she'll have friends to play with, she'll enjoy what she's learning and she'll like her teacher. So far so good.

The only thing I don't really love about the school year is packing a lunch everyday. When Ella started going to public school last year, I was thrilled that she'd be able to eat school lunch so I wouldn't have to do it anymore. When she came home after the first week reporting that she wanted to go back to packing a lunch, I didn't get it. All my memories of school lunch are pretty good--legions of hair-netted lunch ladies scurrying about, preparing a well-balanced, delicious meal for me. Well, Ava and I ate lunch with Ella last year and, right away, I completely understood the boycott. It was pretty disgusting (except for the chocolate milk). Things in the school lunch arena have definitely changed in the last 20 years. Now everything is made at a central facility and brought in. There are a couple of ladies who just take it all out of boxes and slap it onto your tray. Disappointing is all I can say. Anyway, I can clearly see that packing a lunch will be part of my motherly duties for a long time.

I have started back on some routines of my own as well. I'm back to the gym in full force, doing everything possible to get rid of this baby weight. I've given myself a deadline for achieving my goal--when my parents return from their mission to Sao Paulo, Brazil in January, I will (hopefully) be at my ideal size/weight. I'm taking it very seriously and am feeling highly motivated to make it happen this time. I've always used the excuse that I'm in the childbearing years and why should I kill myself to get in shape if I'm just going to gain 60-70 pounds everytime I get pregnant (yes, you read those numbers right)? Well, since I'm pretty sure I'm done, I no longer have that excuse and I need to just go for it. I will be giving myself some rewards as I achieve each weight-loss milestone and I've already bought some blingy designer jeans that I've hung in the front of my closet as my daily motivation. I want to wear them so badly that I literally think of them everytime I'm at the gym feeling precariously close to death. I've been trying to think of something major as my reward once I achieve my goal--so far I've come up with a Diane von Furstenberg dress or a trip somewhere. Any other ideas, send them my way. Now that I've put this all up here for the world to see, I guess I really need to do it. Crap.

lackluster

Man, there are some seriously pimped out blogs out there! As I'm immersing myself deeper and deeper into this new hobby and, therefore, peeking in on more and more people's blogs, I'm seeing some serious design work, photography, links, music playing, etc., etc. Wow. I sincerely apologize. All you've got on my blog is my random thoughts, an occasional photo or two and a whole lot of white space. Unfortunately, decorating my blog happens to fall pretty low on my list of priorities right now. Somehow, taking care of my baby, packing lunch for school, finishing homework, doing laundry, cleaning my house (well, kind of), entertaining a two-year-old and feeding my family rank a little higher right now. Maybe someday when blogs are totally out of style, I'll finally catch up and put something fancy or sparkly on mine.

Speaking of decorating things, I have started a methodical, room-by-room project completion blitz around my house. I am taking one area or room each week and hanging pictures, painting furniture, sewing curtains, buying accessories or whatever else I need to be doing to finish it up. I get as much done as I can and when the week is up, I move on to the next area. Apparently, according to my geeky husband (and I say that lovingly), I'm following some sort of software development methodology called Scrum. The guy who came up with it travels the country and charges tens of thousands of dollars for three days of training so I must be doing something right. Last week I did the kids' bathroom and got almost everything done. This week it's the dining room which needs some major surgery to make it look good. We'll see how I do. Hey, maybe I should put my blog in the rotation as one of my areas to be decorated. Hmmm, now I'm thinking (which is surprising because it's almost midnight). Anyway, stay tuned--for now, I've included some paper from one of the digital scrapbooking kits that I've downloaded in my lame attempt to spiff this place up. So enjoy.

Oh, by the way, dropping a half gallon bottle of milk all over your kitchen floor really sucks.

who?

Recently, our family suddenly and unexpectedly increased in size with the addition of the mysterious and elusive Aunt Carol and Uncle Nate. I don't know where they came from or what they look like but they are quite involved in our lives. They call us on the phone, we send mail to them and we talk frequently of what they're doing and where they are. The only person who seems to know much about them is Avarie. She's the one who introduced us to these long-lost relatives and she is quick to correct us if we confuse or omit any details pertaining to Aunt Carol and Uncle Nate. Seriously, I have no idea where or how these people came to be but she talks about them like they've been around forever. I would love to be able to get into the mind of my little imaginative, creative two-year-old to see how they came to be. I'm not sure how long Aunt Carol and Uncle Nate will be a part of our family but they're welcome to stay as long as they'd like (or at least as long as she'll let them).