Rachel's Field Day

Rachel's field day was much like Miriam's, only with older kids and a few different activities. Our first station was the water tag station. Rachel got a turn being one of the attackers (which made Miriam rather jealous, since Miriam didn't get a turn when she played):

 

Spring Fling: Pobody's Nerfect

After spending the morning at the school and the afternoon at ukulele practice we headed back to the school for the annual Spring Fling, which was made 100% more awesome by the addition of some inflatables. Some friends of ours sponsored the event this year and provided an inflatable slide and a bouncy house and I'm pretty sure the kids (and many adults) thought it was the best thing ever.

We hardly saw the girls; they were off running around with their friends.

Miriam's Field Day

We managed to make it to school on time for Miriam's field day, rolling (pulling for some of us (Benjamin)) out of bed at 8:20 and leaving the house at 8:45. Phew! I forgot the camera, though, so all the pictures are from my cell phone, which means they aren't fabulous. 

This year the kids went to each station class by class (in past years they've split the classes into smaller groups). I really liked it this way. Sometimes finding enough volunteers can be tricky! This way we had the teacher plus whoever showed up to help. I stayed the whole time, another parent was there for about half the time, and someone's grandma showed up to help for a bit the second half. It worked out well, and the kids all had fun together.

Our first station was a pass-the-hoop game where the kids stood in a circle and...passed a hoop around. They had to step through the hoop to pass it on. 

Sassy pant kids

I was outside weeding the garden sometime last week while we were waiting for the bus to arrive and Benjamin noticed that "the girls across the street" (we've lived here for almost five years and that's still what we call them) were playing in their backyard. He asked if he could see if they were allowed to play, so I told him that he could, and off he ran.

Zoë desperately wanted to follow him, but I kept telling her to wait for her sisters. I do let her go over to play, but only when one of them takes her so they can keep her out of trouble and escort her back home when she decides she's finished playing.

She listened for a minute but then started wandering down the driveway toward the street.

"Not you," I said. "You have to wait for your sisters."

She stuck by me for a few more minutes before inching her way to the street again.

"Uh-uh. You wait until Mimi and Rachel come home."

Soon, despite all my firm, steadfast commandments she was soon standing at the very edge of the driveway.

"Zoë..." I warned.

She turned her head to look first one way, then the other before defiantly declaring, "No car!" and making a mad dash across the street.

Rainy walk

We went for a walk through our neighbourhood to see how things were. My camera was on a wonky setting but I couldn't fix it until we were made it to the playground because it was pouring rain (and I didn't want to fiddle with it until I was under the awning). I didn't take an umbrella because, frankly, I don't have enough arms to handle the umbrella, a camera, and two children, so we were just embracing the rain.

Here's the creek behind our house:

Really it's not bad, at least not compared to how things are a little farther downstream.

Rushing, rising riv'lets...

It has been raining steadily for the past three days. I wouldn't say it's pouring—though it certainly has poured at times—but it's been raining heavily. "Heavy bands of rain..." is what the news has been saying. It's hardly let up at all.

The Eno River is breeching its banks. Police have gone house-to-house in the little "sub-neighbourhood" just off of our neighbourhood to evacuate the area and the houses in our neighbourhood that back the river have been warned to be ready.

We're far enough away from the river that I'm not too worried, though I am keeping a close eye on the creek behind our house. It's been fine so far.

Andrew wants me to take the kids on a walk to see if we can see the river (though since houses line the river I'm not sure we'll be able to...)

Apparently the bridge over the creek that the kids have to cross to get to school was nearly flooded this morning when Andrew dropped them off (water was about flush with the road), so I'm not sure how they'll get home if the waters don't start receding...seriously.

Here's a picture of the mill at West Point on the Eno (so if we've taken you there, it'll give you some sort of reference to how high the water is):

From WRAL

Making scripture study count

Last night we were reading D&C 64 as a family (technically only the second half of it because sometimes we can only get through half a chapter in one sitting because when we call the kids for scripture study recently Benjamin and Zoë seem to have heard, "Time for wrestle mania!" and it's just...difficult). When we get to short verses we'll sometimes have Zoë take a turn because (when she's not wrestling Benjamin) she likes to hold her own set of scriptures and babble along.

While Benjamin is capable of repeating whole phrases at a time, and can even sound out some of the words himself, Zoë can only repeat one word at a time.

She got verse 32 last night: "But all things must come to pass in their time."

She's pretty picky about what words she'll attempt saying, so sometimes she'll repeat them and sometimes she'll stare at us like we're crazy. This is how it went down last night:

Me: But
Zoë: But
Me: All
Zoë: ...
Me: Things
Zoë: Sings
Me: Must
Zoë: Must
Me: Come
Zoë: ...
Me: To
Zoë: THREE!!!

We all started laughing. She thought I was trying to get her to count: come, to, three!

All the conference talks

This morning I had to add a quote to my talk. 

I had promised myself the night before I wasn't going to touch it, but then I had a dream about giving my talk and in my dream I used this quote in my conclusion. It was still in my mind when I woke up. I knew it was an actual quote from one of the talks I had read this past month (there were many); it was only a question of figuring out which one it was from. 

While I was using the search command on talk after talk after talk, Rachel came up to me and said, "Huh. Where do you find those?"

"Find what?" I asked.

"Conference talks," she said.

"Oh, they're all online. You just go to lds.org and search for them."

"Cool, 'cuz I need to read some," she said.

"Which ones?" I asked.

"All of them," she said.

Good luck, I thought because there are a lot of conference talks. 

Royal Children

Zoë (re)discovered our dress-ups and has fallen in love with putting on costumes. Her favourite dress seems to be this pink one, which she would have worn to church today if I had allowed it:

Her Highness, Princess Puppybottom, with the royal puppy resting loyally at her feet

44 Times I've Prayed

I gave a talk in sacrament meeting today and while I may have made Andrew sit with me in the congregation when he gave a talk last week, I definitely sat on the stand, by myself, today. We weren't really sure it was going to work but Andrew suggested we go ahead and try it, so I positioned myself on the stand so that the pulpit was blocking me from Zoë's view. 

It worked great and she didn't even care that I wasn't there...until I was there.

Andrew had to run her out as soon I as I stood up and the two of them spent the duration of my talk wandering the hallway finding distractions. Zoë was not impressed...