Last week of soccer

This morning Miriam had her last soccer game of the season as well as her kindergarten preview—both at 10:00. We decided to send her to soccer and I went to the kindergarten preview myself, which was slightly awkward because I think I was the only parent there without a kindergartener in tow, but it was still nice to see all the rooms and meet all the teachers and get the little goody bag for Miriam.

Oh, and then to sit and read my book while waiting for the game to finish. Andrew took all the kids with him so it was just me, my book, and my big ol' belly (and it was lovely).

The soccer game, I hear, was a lot of fun. Andrew gave Rachel the camera to play with and she went to town with it, taking dozens of selfies:

Toothless

This evening Rachel watched a super creepy double-episode of Dr. Who and then Andrew sent her to bed to read more of Two Towers. Suddenly we heard her screaming in her room.

"Ahhh! Ahhh! Ahhhh! Ahhh!" she screamed over and over again.

"Finally!" Andrew cheered.

How he knew she'd managed to finally yank that tooth out is beyond me. I was sure she'd been freaked out by something she'd watched/read. But, no. She'd just managed to yank her tooth out.

And now she has a very gappy smile!

I always wanted to lose my two front teeth simultaneously (when I was a kid I mean, not now) but I didn't manage it. Mine came out one at a time and the second one took so long that there was a tooth in place by the time it left a new gap. My little brother Patrick and my cousin Ash both managed to lose their two front teeth at the same time, at the same time. Somewhere there's a picture of the two of them grinning their toothless grins together.

And now Rachel's managed to do it, too! Some people have all the luck.

Maybe I should have thought of slamming my face into the bottom of my sister's swing to knock my teeth super loose (though I think if Rachel could have a redo she would avoid repeating that incident).

Spring Fling

Last night I went to bed and...didn't wake up again until 6:00 in the morning. And then I went back to bed until around 8:30. And then the kids let me take a nap in the afternoon. And it was glorious because the night before last I kept being woken up by contractions every 20 to 30 minutes—not enough to make me think I was in labour but just enough to make it impossible to really fall asleep (and nothing would stop them; it was infuriating). I was exhausted all day yesterday and when I tried to take a nap it was a big fail (the kids wouldn't even sit quietly to watch a show). But today I felt like a new person. It was great!

Fortunately, Miriam had a field trip to the farm yesterday and they were rather late getting back so I only had Benjamin home, which meant he had no one to fight with. We made banana muffins together with the cool morning air blowing through the windows. When we were finished baking the house was only 74°F! Our A/C is set to 78°F so this was kind of a huge deal—baking...in May...without the air conditioner working its hardest? Amazing. We've been having gloriously cool mornings and evenings.

Miriam with strawberries she picked at the farm

The final countdown...

Last night I asked Andrew what he thought would happen first:

A) I'd finish biking from Price, UT to San Fransisco, CA
B) I'd finish the baby blanket I'm working on
C) I'd finish reading the Book of Mormon
D) I'd finish incubating this baby

"Whoa! No way!" he said. "Bike. Blanket. Book of Mormon. Baby."

Yes. I'm just that good at planning my hobbies (for lack of a better word) around alliteration.

And, yes. Figuring that out really made Andrew's night.

When we left off bike riding at the end of last year we'd completed 1752 of 2438 miles of our hypothetical journey, leaving us stranded around Price, UT, with 686 miles left to go. I have covered 635 miles since I started biking again (when I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes) which is like 30 miles more than I biked last year. I have fifty miles left until we reach our destination, so finishing this is a totally doable feat...unless I have the baby tomorrow.

While I bike I've been alternating between reading, crocheting, and playing Two Dots. I finished a few novels before I figured I could move my scripture study to that time as well, so that's what I do for my morning bike ride now. I'm up to Moroni 5 so I'm almost finished. Five chapters left to go. I'm sure I'll finish either tomorrow or the day after.

As far as the blanket is concerned, I finished crocheting 196 flowers. I stitched them into fourteen rows of fourteen and so far have sewn six of those rows together. I'm going to work on it some more tonight so that will bring me even closer to finishing. It's not a very big blanket but it'll do (pig). Because remember that time Andrew told me it was a crazy idea and I said, "Whatever. It'll be super cute!" Turns out he was right; it was kind of a crazy idea.

The baby, is, in my opinion, ready to make her grand entrance any day now. I had a good appointment today (with no shots!) and we're really just playing the waiting game. My progesterone is wearing off so we'll see what this week brings. As much as I'd like her to come early enough that she's not, you know, born on Benjamin's birthday or something ridiculous like that I'm still completely geared up to be pregnant for a few more weeks.

But if she doesn't come soon I'm clearly going to run out of projects.

So, what's it going to be? Bike. Blanket. Book of Mormon. Baby.

Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica. 

Field Day

A message came home from the school informing parents that they still needed volunteers for field day, specifically for the second grade so I sent the PE teacher an email saying that I would be there...unless I was busy having a baby.

I told Zoë that if she didn't want to go to field day it was up to her to put a stop to it. Apparently she wanted to go to field day. So we went.

I was put on the first shift in the "wellness tent," which meant that I just sat there waiting for children to injure themselves, but our morning went rather smoothly and we hardly saw a child until they started filtering through to get drinks or to squeeze a sponge over their heads. They were really into the idea of cooling off by dumping water on themselves even though we lucked out and got a 70°F morning for our field day. (Yesterday was field day for kindergarten and grade one and although we weren't there for that we did walk to the park—and then looked longingly at the pool because it was so hot and humid, but today? Today was beautiful.)

We stayed at the wellness tent for about an hour before Miriam and Benjamin got bored enough that we decided to follow around Rachel's group for a while.

Our favourite station, I think, was the jump rope station. Rachel's become quite the pro, both on her own and also with others spinning the rope for her. Here she is mid-jump:

Irreverent Streak

Andrew asked Benjamin to say the prayer on dinner this evening—by himself. By the time he was finished there was not a straight face in the room. It helps that he hardly says a single word correctly. I'll write down both what he sounds like and also the translation

Dear Hesnee Saa, 

I'm sanky sor a day and... NO ONE CAN SAY ANYSING! And peas hep a sood. And peas hep a sun come up in morny. Haha! I said a sun! Our sun! In a morny! And peas hep 'em tuh seel betty. And me. And oo! And oo! And oo! And oo! [said while pointing at everyone with his fork] Ezzybody seels betty! Two ezzybodies! And... 

[after much prompting to end the prayer...]  

Inna name Seesee Chist, AMEN!

He was so emphatic about everything he said and was so proud to be saying the prayer without help.

Here, more or less, is what he said:

Dear Heavenly Father,

I'm thankful for the day and NO ONE CAN SAY ANYTHING! And please help the food. And please help the sun come up in morning. Haha! I said the sun. Our sun! In the morning! And please help them to feel better. And me. And you! And you! And you! And you! Everybody feels better! Two everybodies. And...

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen. 

Once again we found ourselves cracking up when we should have been at our most reverent. Eventually this irreverent streak will end, right? I mean...it has to.

I guess no one laughed during Miriam's family prayer this evening, so that's a start...

King Benjamin

We read Words of Mormon for family scripture study last night (which was an interesting juxtaposition for me since I recently finished reading Mormon (poor Mormon is so hopeful in Words of Mormon, but by the time he's writing Mormon he seems a little...depressed)). In The Words of Mormon, Mormon explains that he's going to write an abridgment of the large plates of Nephi and introduces us to King Benjamin.

In fact, King Benjamin is mentioned 10 times in the chapter/book and our little Benjamin could hardly contain himself.

The first person to say King Benjamin was Rachel and when she did he gasped and said, "Sasha just said me!"

Soon Andrew took over reading and started pausing after saying "king" and the girls and I would say, "Benjamin!" and Benjamin would giggle. And it was adorable (even though everyone acted like they were being watched).

Pin the what on the what?!

We don't always have our children teach family night lessons (I taught last week); they've simply been enthusiastic about the idea of teaching lessons (that or one-upping each other, I'm not sure which). This week Miriam volunteered; she worked hard to keep her lesson focused on a central theme and came up with multiple activities ands points of discussion all on her own.

A few things I forgot

This morning Miriam greeted me by saying, "Happy Day-after Mother's Day!" which made me remember that when I walked out of the bedroom on Saturday morning I was greeted with a banner on the floor that Rachel had woken up early to make. It was a lovely surprise.

Pre-baptism pictures

Just before dinner yesterday evening we got Rachel all dolled up and tromped outside to take some pictures for her baptism invitations (sometimes when companies offer me free things I just can't say no—and these free cards expire today so we had to get 'em done).

Rachel had just come home from a soccer game and was sweaty and dirty so I told her to take a shower, but then she was dripping wet so I said, "We'll have to blow dry your hair; come with me."

She followed me into the bathroom and I pulled out my blowdryer.

"You have a blowdryer?!" she asked, amazed.

"Yes," I said. "How else did you think I was going to blow dry your hair?"

"I thought you were actually going to blow on it," she said.

Obviously I don't use my blowdryer very often, but I'm sure I use it at least once a year (maybe)...so it's not like it's a complete mystery. After I finished blow drying her hair I took a section of her hair and put it into a twist.

"Will you do a twist on the other side and put them together in the back?" she asked eagerly, so I did. When I was finished with her hair she said, "This is like elf hair! Now I know what I want to be when I grow up—an elf!"

"You want to be...an elf...when you grow up," I repeated.

"I mean for Halloween!" she said. "Not when I grow up. That would be silly."

She's in the middle of reading Two Towers and watched The Fellowship of the Rings over the weekend so she's a little obsessed with elven culture and all things middle-earth. I was just happy to find a hairstyle that she liked that wasn't a ponytail. She asked me to repeat it this morning for church.