Wal-mart

I spent most of my childhood in a small town in northern Oklahoma. We had one McDonald's and a J. C. Penneys, so when Wal-mart came to town, it was exciting. Soon after Wal-mart showed up, we got a Burger King and a new movie theater. Of course, I also remember that Wal-mart closed down a few of the general stores that had been around for years, but as a kid, all I cared about was the bright new store in town. As I got older, I cared more about the cheap prices at Wal-mart, but I also felt a certain nostalgia walking into a Wal-mart. I'd been in enough of them in the south that I could walk into just about any Wal-mart and know which way to go to get dish soap, contact solution, or a pillow. When I was a senior in high school I worked at our local Wal-mart over Christmas break, and even though I knew first hand what it was like to work at Wal-mart, I never really understood why some people didn't like Wal-mart. After all, it was so cheap!

Then we moved to Pasadena and far away from a Wal-mart. I could walk to Target, but had to drive thirty minutes to get to Wal-mart. So I started to shop at Target and by the time I left California, my loyalties had shifted. Now I dread going to Wal-mart and try to avoid it, but there are a few things I can only find there. So every few months I go to Wal-mart with my fingers crossed that whatever I need will actually be in stock and that I won't be stuck in a long line.

Last week, I ran out of Anna's hair elastics, so we went to Wal-mart. Clearly it made quite an impression on her. Sunday after Church, she found my reusable grocery bags and was pretending to go shopping. Then she put one of the bags on her head and I asked, "Oh, did you buy an Anna?"

"No, Mom. I shop at Wal-mart." Ok, funny that she's never mentioned shopping at Target.

Yesterday, we were driving on the freeway when Anna suddenly yelled, "Look Mom! Look! Wal-mart!" Sure enough, there was a Wal-mart. She hasn't even learned to identify the golden arches yet, but for some reason, she can recognize Wal-mart. That kid cracks me up.

On another note, at lunch yesterday Anna was playing with one of the many Snoopy dolls we own. She said, "Mom, I need my knife," pointing to the butter knife she had used to spread peanut butter on her sandwich. When I asked why she said, "So I can kill Snoopy." Wondering what she meant by that, I gave her the knife and then she poked him in the stomach with it.

"Why do you want to kill Snoopy?" I asked her, not sure if I should laugh or be horrified.

"So I can eat him for lunch." Needless to say, I took the knife away from her but more because I was worried about her getting peanut butter on Snoopy. What a funny kid.

Snarly Face

She wasn't really mad at me when I took this photo. This is just her version of a funny face. It's also the face she makes when she gets mad and usually it's accompanied with an "I want it right now!" I keep telling her, that if she's not careful, the wind will change and her face will freeze like that.

A Few More Halloween Photos

Halloween 2010

Monday: For Family Home Evening, we carved up the one pumpkin I managed to grow in our garden this year. Dad did most of the work, while Anna and I supervised. Evie was already in bed asleep.

Wednesday: I dressed Anna up in her costume and we met her friend Will at the library for story time.

Friday: The kiddos got to go trick or treating at Dad's office and Evie got to wear her costume for the first time.

If you look closely, you might notice that Anna's left eye is pink. Her eye had been oozing eye boogers all day, but I just assumed she had a cold. So we let her root around in all the bowls of candy, leaving her germs behind. Saturday morning, Dan took her to the doctor and learned that in addition to pink eye, both ears were infected. So, yeah, I'm feeling great about my mothering skills.

Saturday: I hate rain on Halloween, but that's what it did on Saturday, when we were planning to go trick or treating. Luckily for me, the rain took a break around six. It was my turn to take Anna out, so despite her ear infections, I took her down our street. She loved it and didn't even want to wear a coat even though it was cold, but in an effort to resuscitate my reputation as a mother, I talked her into wearing a coat anyway. 

 Pretty quickly Evie found the candy bowl, but Anna did her best to keep Evie out of the candy.

 Evie made it out to a few neighbor houses and then spent the rest of the evening at home with Dad, working on her walking skills.

I'm starting to understand why some parents hate Halloween. Anna is noticeably more hyper after eating candy. She also often demands that we give her candy, "right now!" (her new favorite phrase). I decided I'd let her eat a bunch Saturday night and then we'd start to empty her bucket for her. I guess Anna was overwhelmed by all her options, because she opened several different kinds. She'd eat a piece and then move onto something else, except with the suckers, she just popped both into her mouth. A few minutes later though, she had abandoned both suckers and moved on to another type of candy. 

Four Teeth

Evie's top two teeth are finally starting to show.

Evie continues to be my easiest child. Recently though, she's started to make this whining noise if I'm too slow getting her some food to eat. It sounds like a puppy's whine and it breaks my heart. She's also become very interested in what it is I'm doing when I try to put her hair up. I usually put her in the bumbo chair in front of the bathroom mirror and hand her a little brush to play with. She loves to lean back and try to get a look at me, which makes it hard to get her hair into an elastic, let alone, to get a straight part for piggy tails. When she's not doing back bends to get out of her bumbo chair, she's started clapping. She's also become quite intent on stealing Anna's binky. If Anna is lying down on the floor getting her diaper changed (no, potty training isn't going well), Evie will often crawl over and try to rip Anna's binky out of her mouth. She found one of her own binky's the other day, so I let her have it, but she didn't really suck on it. Instead she bit down on it and started breathing/spitting around it. She sounded like a little Darth Vader baby.

Thursday night Dan was looking at photos of Anna when she was Evie's age and as cute as Anna was, it was sad to me that we didn't have Evie with us then. We're so grateful that she's a part of our family. I can't imagine our family without her.

Canadian Thanksgiving

Last November I had enough turkey bucks at Maceys to get a small turkey for free. Since we were celebrating Thanksgiving at my parents' house, I stuck it in my freezer and basically forgot about it. I kept thinking that one of these days I'd get it out and roast it, but I never seemed to get around to it. Around the first part of October, I decided it was now or never. Since Dan served his mission in Canada, I thought Canadian Thanksgiving would be a great excuse to invite friends over to share it with us. But being an ignorant American, I assumed that Canadian Thanksgiving is late in the month of October and probably on a Thursday. Around mid-October, I looked it up on the internet and discovered that that very day was Canadian Thanksgiving (the second Monday in October). Oops!

To make a long story short, we decided to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving a few weeks late and on a Saturday when I figured I would have enough time to stuff a turkey and roast it. We invited one authentic Canadian and another friend who served her mission in Toronto and their families. We kept it pretty simple, but as always there was still more than enough food.

 I had to get a photo of Evie's first time eating mashed potatoes, gravy, and stuffing. She LOVED it all. Anna, on the other hand, didn't eat anything but a mint brownie.

 Then she got bored and decided to see what mashed potatoes could do for her hair.

Finally I cleaned her up and let her get down and crawl around while the older kids played and the adults sat and solved all the world's problems. She was pretty content to toodle around and I kept finding her under the adults' table. She was probably looking for more food to eat.

Bed Time and Hide and Seek

Anna has a hard time going to bed most nights. She's often awake until after nine even though we read stories and tuck her in around eight. Some nights she plays quietly in her bed until she falls asleep. Some nights she calls out regularly, doing anything to get us to come visit her in her room. Tonight is one of those nights where she's been calling out and since I've been home alone while Dan was at Church meetings, I ignored many of her shouts for attention. Finally I went in to check on her and she said, "my pants came off" as if they just leaped off her body. I guess I should be surprised she doesn't strip all her clothes off more often. So I put her pants back on and tucked her in. Maybe this time, she'll start to settle down.

Yesterday morning she talked me into playing Hide and Seek with her. She learned this game from our neighbors Hayden and Parker when they came over to play. Hayden is five, but since Parker is only a little older than Anna, neither he nor Anna really understood the hiding part. Hayden would start counting and they'd both run to the opposite end of the house squealing. Then they'd stand in plain view, waiting for him to "find" them.

When I played with Anna, it was pretty similar. She let me hide first, so I hid under a sheet she had been playing with in our family room (she was making bubbles and popping them). After that, whenever I started to count, Anna would ask me to help her hide under the sheet. I tried to pick hiding spots that would be easy for her to find, like crouching down on the far side of our bed. But that one was a bit too hard for her. I had to call out to her so she could find me. Once I hid in the bathtub, making sure to make a lot of noise with the shower curtain so she'd know where to look. Another time I hid in my closet, just inside the door. It was so fun to watch her check beside the bed where I had hid before. When she realized I wasn't there and turned around, she could have easily spotted me, but she wasn't looking for me in the closet. I couldn't resist. When she got close, I jumped out and yelled "boo." She shrieked and it was loud. Not a great thing to do when Evie is taking a nap. I think she felt genuinely betrayed by me for scaring her, so after that the game was pretty much over.

As I was huddled in one of my hiding spots, I thought, "this is so much fun. Why don't I think to do this with Anna more often?" For some reason, I am always so concerned with all the things I need to do, like cleaning the bathrooms and balancing the check book, but when I do take time to play with my kids, it's always the highlight of my day. Of course, today we didn't have time for Hide and Seek as we were rushing off to story time and then to Costco. Maybe tomorrow.