Sunday, that one day

Church was both horrible and wonderful at the same time today.

First of all we were fifteen minutes late due to a certain three-year-old's dress not being "twirly" enough. I won't mention any names but I will mention that said child threw herself on the ground in a fit of passion and it took several precious minutes to get her into a suitably "twirly" dress.

To top off that little fiasco we had to walk to church. In the snow. In April.

What gives, Mother Nature?!

Sacrament meeting was horrible. Actually, it was likely wonderful but I missed that vibe due to my horribly misbehaving children.

Screaming. Screeching. Fighting. Biting.

It was awful.

These are a few of my favourite things...

1) Rachel

2) Miriam

3) Rachel and Miriam sleeping*

4) Miriam and Rachel playing nicely together

5) Me sleeping

* In the pictures, Rachel is pretending to sleep and Miriam is actually sleeping. I just thought I would clarify that in case anyone thought that Rachel was actually taking a nap. She wasn't. We're still waiting on those flying pigs... Also, that is not Rachel's bed. That is a toy box. 

Out of the pan and into the...

Miriam has ended up in some interesting places this week. So far she's been stuck in a frying pan, a bath towel (which, by the way, is one of her new words)...

Happy Birthday, Auntie Josie

This morning when I woke Rachel up she said, "I think I had a good sleep again last night."

"I think so, too," I said. 

"Two nights in a row!?" she exclaimed with wonder. 

Sometimes I just can't believe it, either.

We did a French ponytail (or at least what my mom always called a French ponytail) in her hair this morning and then had breakfast (toast) on the run since doing her hair took so long. 

Rachel was very pleased with her look today, both her hair and her outfit.

It was good that she looked so cute because today we went over to my parents' house to celebrate Josie's birthday. She's seventeen today, which I can't even believe!

Albinos

Conference weekend was wonderful. Emily and Morgan came down from Idaho so we got to have a family lunch yesterday afternoon with Andrew and all his sisters and their husbands. We were only missing Jacob, who is still on his mission in Peru and doing great (he just became a zone leader; he's pretty excited...and overwhelmed).

It's funny to watch Emily and Morgan being so—dare I say this—young and in love.

I still feel like I'm young and in love but when I see Emily and Morgan I can tell that...they behave differently than Andrew and I do.

For one thing, I can't think of the last time I called Andrew Andrew. Usually I call him Daddy.

For another, Morgan got home from priesthood session and Emily literally ran up the stairs and into his arms. Andrew got home from priesthood session and I gave him a quick peck as I handed him the baby and said, "Let's get these kids to bed!"

Like I said, I still feel like I'm young and in love but obviously things have changed around here.

Does this mean we left the honeymoon stage without me even realizing it? Are we no longer newly weds? Are we getting *gulp* old?

Garth N. Jones Writing Award

A while ago Andrew got an email announcing a writing contest open to all MPA students. He's taking 21.5 credits this semester, which means he's a little pressed for time (hello, understatement of the year) but since there was a cash prize he figured he should enter. There was nothing in the rules about using a paper written for a class, so Andrew took the criteria for the essay contest and the criteria for one of his final papers, combined them and wrote a stellar 10-ish page paper about the managerial style of Mubarak and how it contributed to the collapse of his regime. (Click here to read it...if you want).

He never heard back about the contest, and since the awards banquet was coming up we just figured that he didn't win and we wouldn't be going to the banquet, even though it was a stellar paper and he got 100% on it when he turned it in for class (my husband is so smart). 

On Tuesday, however, he got called into the office. They had looked over the list of banquet attendees and noticed that he wasn't on it. They informed him that he had to come because he had won the writing contest. 

April showers bring...grumble, mumble, mumble

Yesterday was beautiful once again. A balmy, sunshiny 75 degrees. Perfect, in my opinion. 

We planted some peas and transferred Rachel's sunflowers from their little pot on the windowsill to the garden. There were ten sunflowers in a pot the size of a thimble and they were getting a little crowded. Okay, so the pot was bigger than a thimble; it was more like two inches in diameter, which is still a little small for ten sunflowers. 

In the afternoon a storm rolled in, which we were expecting. By the evening we were having a nice April shower. 

When we went to bed I said, "Oh, I hope those sunflowers are alright..."

Andrew said, "Of course they'll be alright. They've been through a lot already; they're survivors. Besides, it's not like it's going to snow..."

Carl Bloch exhibit

This afternoon we went to the Carl Bloch exhibit at BYU. It was wonderful; it made us a little travel-hungry but also almost made us feel like we had escaped to Europe for a bit. Really, though, a bit of Europe escaped to us.

Perfect day for playing

Yesterday afternoon it was nice and warm outside, which was perfect since I needed to do my run during the day since I was busy in the evening. My dad came to the park with us so that he could play with Miriam and Rachel while I ran laps. He asked what she could do at the park and I answered that she mostly likes to swing and eat dirt but that she wasn't too keen on heights or sliding. 

While I was running Grandpa helped Miriam warm up to the slide. She even got brave enough that she started going down all by herself, she shoved his hands away from her and said, "No!" when he tried to help her. She's in that "I do! I do! I do!" stage.

Today it got up to about 73°F (23°C) so we went to the park again, naturally. We invited Grandpa along as well since he'll be leaving to spend the summer working in Germany at the end of the month. We need to get our Grandpa-time in while we can!

Miriam showed off her dazzling slide skills:

Sisters

Andrew and I just got home from a banquet about an hour ago. He won an award—the Garth N. Jones Writing Award—which I'll post about later since I neglected to take any pictures with our camera. I still have about a half hour left of work and since it's 11:30 I'll be quick here because I do like to be in bed, or at least heading in that direction, by midnight. I can probably count on one hand the number of times that has happened since grad school happened...three years ago.

It's a bad habit.

And I'm not even the one in grad school.

Anyway, Grandma put the girls to bed for us, even though Rachel claimed she was "not tired," so they were asleep when we came home. That did not stop them, however, from sensing that we were home once we got here and crying out for attention. Children have magical parental-sensors and they can just tell when their mommy is near and when she isn't. I don't know how they do it.

Miriam needed to nurse, of course, and Rachel needed to be re-tucked-in.

I thought Rachel was asleep when I put Miriam back to bed but apparently she wasn't because just as I sat back down in my chair to work she started grunting and groaning.