January 2012 Snapshots

On January 14, my sister Jamie and her husband Chris were sealed to Tyler. Then a few days later, they moved to California. We were glad we could go to the sealing and glad they had it in Utah so we could be there.

In January, I decided to try green smoothies as a way to get my kids to eat some sort of vegetable. For the first few days, I thought the green mustaches were very funny and cute. I still think they're cute, but they're not so much of a novelty anymore and we also started using straws, which usually means no green mustaches.

Preschool at our house. Anna has really enjoyed preschool. I love the group of moms and kids we did it with, but I'm not going to lie. I was very happy when I had my last day to teach, but that's not to say I hated teaching. I just didn't relish it.

I let Anna paint one day and she decided to give herself red gloves.

My cute Evie in the sweater and hat Dan's aunt knitted for him.

Memorial Day 2011 etc.

For Memorial Day, I took the kids up to the Brigham City Cemetery where my mom's parents are buried along with some of my other ancestors. The weather was awful. When we got to Brigham City it was raining and cold. We stood outside for much too long, but after driving all that way, I didn't want to just toss the flowers out the door and turn around and go home. After visiting the cemetery, my cousin Connie and I took the kids to McDonald's to play. 

This is a photo of Evie with Connie's daughter Sarah. Like Evie, Sarah is also adopted and is part hispanic or Latina. I still haven't figured out which is the best term to use. Sarah was great with my kids.

Evie LOVES her pink snow boots and is always brining them to me so that I'll put them on her. She also loves the idea of carrying a purse, or in this case, a Trader Joe's bag. Since I took this photo she's also started demanding that I dress her in Anna's dance recital outfit. She is clearly all girl.

At the Thanksgiving Point Children's Garden--one of our favorite summer spots.

I had to take our car into the dealer to get the oil changed (when we bought it, it came with a year's worth of free maintenance). Rather than sit in the waiting room, I figured we'd walk over to a nearby park.

Evie has no fear when it comes to slides. This is one of the tallest slides I've seen at a park. Anna climbed to the top first and decided she didn't want to slide down. But then Evie climbed up there and without a second thought, she slid down it on her tummy. After that, Anna decided it would be okay to go down the slide too.

Sneezing and Muffin Tops

Evie is really into mimicking lately. On Sunday, while we were at Church, she found a kleenex in the diaper bag. She would squint her eyes shut and puff air out her nose and then wipe her nose with the kleenex. I think she was "sneezing." Whatever she was doing, it was so funny to watch.

A few nights ago we were going through the nightly rigamarole of trying to get Anna in bed. Both Dan and I were in Anna's bedroom. I admit that I felt pretty defeated, so I got in her bed and started to doze off. But before I was completely gone I heard Anna say, "Dad, you eat a lot of food? You got a fat tummy? You got a muffin top in there?" Maybe that's why Dan went to the gym this morning.

Last night Dan and I were talking about how to spend our tax return and making plans for our yard and our house. We had talked about finishing our basement but decided in the last week or so to wait until next year. Part of my reason for being so anxious to finish our basement is because Dan has said that he thinks two kids are plenty, but before he would even consider a third child, we'd need to finish the basement. Yesterday, I was looking at Evie and thinking about how quickly she's growing up. I have been thinking that we really should get started on the adoption application process. So last night I brought it up with Dan.

Me: So, how do I say this? I'm just thinking about the basement. Um, ... I guess what I'm really trying to say is that I think it's time to start the adoption application process again and I'm wondering if you're gonna make me wait until the basement is finished.

Dan: I don't think it matters whether we finish the basement or not because I think I'm done. I'm not sure I can handle a third kid.

Me: It's just that Evie's growing up so fast and it will take six months to finish the application anyway, so I think now's a good time to start.

Dan: No. I think we're done. Two is plenty.

Me: Well, in that case, can we get a swing set this summer?

That got an easy yes. Dan once swore that we'd never have a swing set because it's bad for the grass, but I've been coaching Anna all summer to ask Dad for a swing set and I think he's starting to soften, especially with my awesome negotiating skills.

Poopy Fingers and Silly Bands

Excerpt from today's email to Ryan:

Things are going a little better for me this week, in large part because I set very low expectations for myself. I decided that nap time and potty training weren't going to work well together. So I gave up on having Anna take naps and focused on getting Evie one good nap. Miraculously for me, for a few days there she slept for almost three hours. I was totally amazed since she has been taking one hour naps, but at the same time now that Anna's not taking naps, nap time isn't such a break for me. But it's nice to have a few hours in which Anna isn't squeezing the life out of Evie or yanking her toys away or doing whatever else that makes Evie cry. In some ways it was sort of nice not to worry about fighting with Anna to get her to take a nap and she does a better job playing on her own, so I did squeeze a few things besides laundry and dishes in this week.

The potty training is a less positive story. I guess I need to go back to the potty training books, but I feel like I have tried everything and it's just not clicking with her. We've reached the point where as long as I get her to sit on the potty (usually by bribing her with candy) every thirty minutes, then she keeps her panties dry. But I can't get her to anticipate the need to go at all, so I spend a lot of my day trying to get her to the bathroom before she has an accident and most days I forget at least once or twice. I made all these commitments about potty training and I haven't kept a single one. I said I'd never use candy to bribe her. I planned to have her potty trained early, and I said I'd never use pull-ups. These days it's candy all day long and whenever I can't take it anymore or we need to go out, I stick her in pull-ups, which she just treats like a diaper. And whenever I talk to other moms about it, they all give me advice, but that just makes me feel like a bigger failure because I feel like I've tried it all and it's just not working for us. I think what's really going on here is that Anna is training me to better understand her personality. She just likes to take her time about these things and I'm sure that one day it will just click. I guess I'd put her back in diapers at this point and try again in a month or two, but I don't think she'll wear them. She wants to wear panties, which is also a bit of progress.

In between the potty training and the lack of naps, I finally finished the DVD I was compiling for Anna's birth mom. For Anna's third birthday, I wanted to put together all the videos I have of Anna over the past year and send it to her birth mom, along with some professional photos of Anna. Well, Anna's birthday came and went and I was a long ways off from getting the DVDs done. I felt so guilty about being late because I know that birthdays can be a rough time for birth moms, but I just couldn't manage to find the time to get it done. I also ran into some technical problems. I had so much video of Anna that I had to burn it onto two DVDs, but the good news is that I finished it this week. I'm going to try to be a lot more careful now about starting projects with deadlines. I think I just do better if I have something I can work on when I do happen to have a few moments to myself, as long as I'm not trying to get it done in time for a birthday or a holiday, because something always comes up to interrupt me.

I've also managed to find some time to go running again. I'm hoping to find a half marathon around the middle of the summer that I can enter. Then if all goes well and I don't injure myself, I'm going to try for my first marathon in September. It's nice to be running again and most of the time it makes me a happier person, but I have such a hard time going to bed early enough and then I'm up at 5:30 so that I can go running and be back home in time to let Dan have his turn at the gym. And now that there's no nap time, it's hard to catch up on my sleep.

Speaking of nap time, by Friday of this past week, I was exhausted, so I decided that during Evie's nap time, I'd put Anna in her room for quiet time. Well, after thirty to forty minutes, I heard Anna call out. At first I planned to ignore her, but then I started to worry that she really needed me. So I went to check on her and after seeing me, she wasn't interested in staying in her room. I tried to close her door, but then she started banging on it. So I let her out and went to lie down again. Her loud banging woke Evie up, but Evie wasn't too upset, so I left her in her crib. Then a few minutes later, Anna started screaming my name. I told her to come to me and tell me what was going on. She came into my room and said, "Mom, I've got poop on my hands." Once again, she decided to stick her hands into her diaper after pooping. So after that I just got Evie up and gave up on the nap.

So yesterday Anna got to go to a Princess birthday party. As part of the party favors, she got to bring home a mylar balloon and some of those silly bands bracelets. Today in Church Evie was playing with one of Anna's silly bands. She started to pull on it and she was totally stretching it out. I started to wonder if she was going to break it and then suddenly it was gone. It shot off her fingers like a rubber band. Then a woman a few rows up, lifted her hand up to the back of her head and turned around with a confused look on her face. I kind of mouthed, "Sorry. It was Evie," as they handed back the silly band. Anyway, I thought it was hilarious.

Celebrating Christmas with Evie's Birth Family

The Saturday before Christmas (Dec. 18), we got together with Evie's birth family, Heather, Tamara, and Kelly, to exchange Christmas gifts. We met up at the Rio Grande Cafe, a place Dan and I used to go to several years ago. We've missed it. The food was great even if some of the other patrons weren't too excited about our present-opening extravaganza. We had a good time.

Tamara wrestles with Evie

Evie spent only a little time in her high chair, eating some refried beans that I fed her. Most of the time, she was being held and she did not want to hold still. This girl is always on the go.

 Anna was a pretty good sport, especially when she realized that some of the presents were for her.

 Of course Evie enjoyed playing with the bow almost as much as she enjoyed the actual presents.

 Heather gave Evie and Anna a Little People Zoo to share. Of course, in Anna's mind this toy never belonged to Evie and she has completely commandeered it. But for  Evie got to push the box around the house a few moments before we opened it.

 Heather and her parents also gave the girls matching pjs. The zoo is a huge hit, along with the books they gave Anna and Evie too. It took a few days, but Anna is starting to share the animals with Evie.

This photo really has nothing to do with getting together with Evie's birth family, but that same night my sister Katie brought Anna her Christmas present since Anna wasn't at the family Christmas party. So I guess there was a present for her to open at that party after all. Katie gave Anna a Disney Princess Memory game and of course Anna loves it. The cards have been scattered all over our house, but I think we've managed to gather them all up again. Anna also got a Cinderella doll for Christmas and the other day I caught her holding her Cinderella doll, pointing to Cinderella on the cover of her Memory game and saying, "That's you!"

Two and a Half Years Old

Anna turned two and a half at the beginning of September. Her favorite food is definitely waddyoli (ravioli) and she asks for it for lunch almost every day. She is also happy to eat any kind of candy. Whenever we go to Costco, she always tells me that she needs a soda, which is probably really only funny to me because we so rarely drink soda. But, we had it there once and so now she always tells me she needs a soda.

Her favorite books these days are any of the Olivia books by Ian Falconer. This week she's really into Olivia Helps with Christmas. She also loves going to dance class where they chasse and do somersaults. A few things still seem to mystify her like first position. Getting those heels to touch and her toes to turn out requires just a bit more coordination than she's up to at this point. Along with her love of dance class comes her current adoration of the TV show Angelina Ballerina.

Anything mom does, Anna wants to do it too. I inflamed my IT band with all my running this summer and the PT prescribed walking sideways with an elastic band around my legs in order to strengthen my hips. So of course Anna likes to do it too. She also wants a ring like Mom's, but I told her she has to wait until she gets married. Marriage seems like a pretty good thing to her because she knows that you go to the temple to get married and Anna is still talking about the nice ladies at the temple.

Anna still loves her blankies and is totally addicted to her binky. Whenever she gets especially frustrated or hurt, she'll often wail, "I need my binky" followed by "where my blankies?" She can't go to sleep without either and lately she's been waking up at night, and calling out to me. Often as soon as I get in there she says, "where my binky?" and most of the time she settles down as soon as she has it in her mouth. As soon as she gets potty trained, we're going to work on getting rid of the binky.

Lately she's also started talking a little bit more about her birth mom. I'm sure part of it is just because she's actually talking more and forming her own phrases and sentences and also because I've been talking about it with her. She knows that her blue eyes look like Daddy's but she got them from her birth mom. One day out of the blue she told Dan that she missed her birth mom. She also calls her green blanket her birth mom blanket. Today I asked her if she wanted her birth mom blanket and she said something that sounded like, "Her put me in your arms and said 'here's your baby,'" repeating what I've told her about the day we brought her home. We're so grateful that she's a part of our family.

Evie's Finalization

On Monday (July 26), we went to court in Provo and finalized Evie's adoption. Evie missed her morning nap and was a little fussy towards the end when the judge was making it official, so it sounded like she objected, but she's stuck with us now. Heather came and brought her mom Tamara and her coworker Missy. My sister Erica also came. It was nice to have them all there and I was also grateful Tamara for helping to keep Anna quiet during the hearing.

Cabela's

On February 27, we got to see Heather and her parents again. We met up at Cabela's and it was a fun reunion. In fact, we so enjoyed talking to each other that before we had realized it, we had spent four hours there.

Four hours is a long time for an almost-two-year-old, but Anna loved exploring Cabela's. So that meant that Dan and I got to take turns following Anna around the store. When it was my turn, I dragged Anna all over the store looking for chocolate-covered cinnamon bears, but couldn't find any. So we bought a pound of gummy bears. Then I started looking for funny things for her to take to show daddy.
We didn't end up buying this hat, but I had fun putting it on Anna. She loved the giant fish pillow and I wish I would have caught Dan's reaction on camera when she walked up to him with it. But alas, our camera is a little slow. Or maybe it was the photographer. :)
As much fun as I had following Anna around from the porch swings to the pink camo camp chair promoting breast cancer awareness, the highlight of the day was catching up with Heather and her parents. They even brought Anna a birthday present of some board books and a Magna Doodle Glow, which Anna is still loving. For me it was a perfect Saturday: spending fun time with my kids and catching up with good friends.