Blossoming vocabulary

Zoë is a squawker. She'd much rather grunt (or scream) and point than figure out how to get the words in her mind to come out of her mouth. But I know there are words in there. Her comprehension is great. Case in point:

• A few weeks ago I mentioned that I needed to get started on Miriam's birthday cake and Zoë dropped everything and ran over to me, insisting that we play pat-a-cake right that very instant. She was like, "Cake? I've got this!"
• I was nursing Zoë one evening and Andrew mentioned something being "disappointing" and Zoë stuck her little index finger out and started jabbing it in the air. She was just a-pointin' as hard as she could!
• Andrew once tripped over her and said, "Oh, no! Did I step on your foot?" She looked up at him, walked over and stomped on his foot, and then acted all proud that she had followed directions so perfectly. (Pronouns are hard).

Sometimes she'll mouth words, mimicking the shape of our lips but without making any sounds; and she'll randomly blurt out words (like "HAMILTON!" or "MEADOW!") if she's caught up in the moment and forgets that talking is hard.

She can sign "more" and "all done" and "please" (and chicken and duck for whatever reason*).

Her spoken vocabulary is slowly coming along, though.

Rainy days and Tuesdays...always get me down

I'm not even sure what to say. Tuesdays have seemed rather catastrophic the past couple of weeks and besides that I'm basically a ball of stress. But we'll get through this.

A sweet friend, knowing that I'd had a difficult Tuesday last week, stopped by on Wednesday morning with a frozen lasagna so that, at the very least, I wouldn't have to worry about dinner. We visited for a few minutes but then she let me go so that I could start working on untangling the gigantic knot my life has gotten itself into. As I closed the door I couldn't help but dissolve into a fit of laughter—the kind where you're so close to tears that if you don't laugh you're definitely going to break down and cry.

Why?

Our oven is broken!

Scripture study

After FHE tonight we pulled out the scriptures and the kids all sat on Andrew while we read 3 Nephi 26. It was an interesting arrangement, but I think that overall they behaved more reverent sitting this way than they do when we have them sit on, for example, the couch. It might have to become a regular thing.

Fun Run 2016

The girls had their fun run on Thursday morning. Benjamin, Zoë and I went to help out and cheer them on. Rachel's run was at 8:00 in the morning (it sure is a whole lot more difficult to make it to school in time for these first-thing-in-the-morning events than it was last year, that's for sure) and we helped at the water station. Rachel wasn't very excited about running.

She mostly just walked around the track, chatting with her friends. She completed 35 laps, which was quite a feat considering she walked the whole time. She's reached the age where she doesn't think I'm very cool to hang out with (but she's totally wrong on that front) and spent most of her morning pretending I wasn't there, so I didn't get (m)any good pictures of her...

Cousin Carter (10/28/2016)

Jacob and Shayla had their baby on Friday! His name is Carter Noel and he's a real cutie—isn't his hair adorable?!

Oi, what a month. (What do you mean it's the 1st of November?)

Andrew was feeling swamped with school stuff so when Benjamin's soccer practice was cancelled I told Andrew to go ahead and stay on campus. "I'll do soccer tonight," I said. "I'll just take Benjamin and Zoë with me to Miriam's practice and they can play at the playground. It'll be fine."

So we did our typical Tuesday afternoon scramble. Eat something! Get into soccer clothes! Get in the van! Pick up Dylan! Drive to the mall to meet Dylan's mom...

I'm a pretty cautious driver. I plan my routes in advance so that I can get to my destination with the least number of lane changes possible and even if I know where I'm going I usually turn on the GPS anyway so that Siri can soothingly instruct me to "use the two outside lanes to turn right in 500 feet" or whatever she's scripted to do. My children know that they're not supposed to talk to me while I'm driving because it stresses me out. I don't listen to music or podcasts or anything. Getting up to speed is a challenge for me—thirty-five is probably my favourite speed (next to, you know, twenty-five (or, you know, walking)).

Anyway, I was in the far right lane because I knew we had an awful (5-way, super weird) intersection coming up where there is no turn lane, so traffic wanting to turn left is always backed up in the left lane. My plan was to drive in the right lane until I passed that intersection and then I'd move into the left lane (which is a pretty easy lane change since traffic is so backed up, leaving it mostly empty just after the intersection). 

I didn't even make it to that troublesome intersection, however, because...

...OOF!

This is Halloween

In spite of (or because of) all the excitement surrounding Halloween and trick-or-treating, I was a bit of a grumpy mom today. I felt like no one would listen and that everyone was constantly whining. Zoë woke up early and refused to nap, which was a bad combination paired with the late-night gab session I'd had with Rosie. She and Benjamin were doing their best to pull the house apart. And then their sisters came home and everyone was fighting and I was going crazy. 

Maybe I'm just not used to being so outnumbered (thanks for pampering me, visitors) but four kids can be a lot of work. Phew!

We still managed to have a pretty okay day. It was beautiful and sunny out so I took Benjamin and Zoë outside to prepare our pumpkins for carving. They had fun scooping out the guts.

Lunch fail

Miriam really wanted to pack lunch from home today (usually she just gets school lunch). She asked me about it every day this weekend and on Sunday night she finally got to do it! She put together this spooktacular feast:

Age Gap Problems

On Sunday we went to church as usual, though it was nice (once again) to have an extra pair of hands to help get children ready in the morning. I've been so spoiled this month—between General Conference, Grandma visiting, and Rosie visiting, I've only had to get the kids ready for church on my own once.

Rosie came to nursery with me and it was nice to have an extra pair of hands in there as well.

After church we came home and had a movie afternoon with Hocus Pocus and popcorn. Andrew came home and made dinner, then we ate, went on a walk, put the children to bed, and then Rosie and I talked until the wee hours of the morning.

Saturday with Rosie: Soccer, Grist Mill, Duke Chapel

We had another go-go-go Saturday, of course. Rosie and Zoë and I went to Miriam's soccer game while Rachel and Andrew went to Benjamin's. It was supposed be our last week of soccer but our season was extended by a week (because we missed so many games due to bad weather (Hurricane Matthew, for example). Miriam's team went ahead with their final celebration anyway, since it had been planned before we knew for certain the season was going to be extended.

Here's Miriam (second from left) with her teammates:

Her award was "most improved player." She really did improve by leaps and bounds this season!